High Bride-price: When Shall Africans Learn?
January 16th, 2010
If there is anything at all Africa is in need of, it is nothing but cultural education of life. The financial demands of traditional marriages and funeral ceremonies in this part of the world have completely brought many individuals and families to down to their knees, ruination and even sent them to early graves courtesy of stroke or high blood-pressure; still we are far from learning great lessons maybe because we have become inured to learning our lessons in hard ways.
Consummations of traditional marriages and funeral ceremonies constantly occur anywhere in the world but what follows upon occurrences in Africa is a situation which if not well managed could also lead to the death of newly-weds or deceased families as the case maybe. This write-up is particularly concerned about traditional marriages in Africa especially in the Nigerian society and the greedy roles played by such families.
Many traditional weddings in Africa have after the ceremonies welcomed poverties and disheartening images in the homes of the newly-weds. This can be particularly blamed on the family of the bride because they always want everything from grooms, a situation like this may also be blamed on the couple, who for what the people of the world may assume them, overstretch their spending by accepting loans, borrowing and even disposing-off valuable possessions just to meet up with marriage demands. It is therefore not uncommon to find couple begging for foods two weeks after holding their marriage.
The aftermaths of extravagance, unnecessary grand and colourful activities that are tied to marriages often leave couples in chains, abandonment and in sorrow. I shall try to explain how families of brides in many part of Africa sale their daughters thus making life meaningless for them.
In our African society, many cultures require that a bride-price be paid before a man can marry a woman but the idea of payment of this bride-price has been mismanaged, and grotesquely distorted to means of one-day generation of money for the family of the bride. Our families in Africa have become materialistic only wondering how much more they could making marrying –off their daughters to supposedly wealthy individuals in the society. These families want to keep eating continuously from dowries and bride-price of their daughters.
A situation whereby dowries and pride-price are negotiated should be discouraged because humans are no goods and the days of slavery are past. Interestingly, it is customary for the family of the bride and groom in some part of Africa to employ the middlemen who negotiate and bargain on the price of bride-price to be paid. The same method our fore-fathers who acted as middlemen captured and negotiated away their children who were sold to Europeans slave traders. Many a marriage has been brought to an abrupt end because the representatives of families who went on negotiation would either not agree on any particular sum or the groom could simply not afford the sum levied on his wife to be. This is disgustingly terrible.
The implication of the developments pointed out here is that many unmarried cohabit and bear children which in Nigeria we call “Lagos marriage.” Sometimes cohabiting may be considered immoral in the society but the act has with financial convenience enabled many of such victims to achieve their aims because when the groom comes knocking at the of his in-laws for marriage, he is sometimes leniency maybe accorded him because of the belief that he may after all abandon their daughter.
This greed in families has also led to the bankruptcy of newly-weds and brought about elopements too, and such daughters are never to be seen again until he returns with pregnancy which her clever man may deny. An ugly situation created by this may also be seen in the availability of adult-singles who litter around African streets, many of these singles have availed themselves of the opportunities to defraud true marriage seekers online especially Americans and Europeans thus further discrediting the image of the continent.
Although, marriage negotiation remains the affair of families involved but greed for high bride-price should be checked and discouraged by governments if this social problem is to be effectively put under check and ugly consequences often leading to large number of divorces in our court should be reduced. In this way, jostling for large share of money from bride-price among family members and elders of villages should be discouraged. We may sometimes expect reasonable family members to accept half of bride-price and return the rest of it to the groom because the money will be used to take care of their daughter, and this way their daughter will be have a happy home. We have also observed some families heads who in the course of marriage negotiations state that they would accept anything given to them.
Unfortunately, many churches in Africa today have encouraged large spending and affluence in the organization of Christian marriages between their members, and many of these churches are still in existence today. It is also stands to reason to understand that two of the Christian denominations who have stood out, not being carried away by unreasonable demands are Deeper Life Bible Church and Jehovah’s Witnesses. Anyone of you who have had the opportunities to attend weddings organized by these denominations will readily agree that much time and affluence are not exhibited in these churches.
We want to call on the Nigerian Government to curtail the greed occasioned by bride-price by enacting and enforcing a law as we have seen in a tiny West African State of Togo which states that “bride-price can be paid in kind or in cash or in both ways”
The law adds: “In no case should the amount exceed the sum of 10,000 F CFA (US$20.00).” (Negotiating a Reasonable Bride-Price, www. Watchtower.org)
Our Government of Nigeria should also realize that it owes its subjects social responsibilities, and operating this will make our society a good for all and finally reduce corruption and desperation among the youths of the country. After all marriage can be a free gift from God, and most youths who plunder the society, engage in robberies, assassinations and other forms of nefarious activities do so to favour women.
