Nigerian Men Killing Their Wives – Calling A Spade What It Is (Part 2)

Okay, let me start off from where I stopped in part [1] of this article. My father once told me that if a man cuts his head for a woman and the man afterward uses a calabash or pumpkin as his new head, a woman will still tell that man that she wants that calabash or pumpkin too. They are never satisfied. For those kind of women, if a man wants ‘A’, they want ‘B.’ If a man wants B they want ‘GB’. Meanwhile, to people who do not know ‘GB’ is an alphabet in Yoruba. You never know where they are coming from. Some of them are so arrogant and stubborn to a fault. Some will even tell it to their husbands’ faces that: hope they remember that North American is a woman’s world. Exaggeration apart, some of our women have learnt by heart American marital laws. You need to see them recite them whenever there is any debate. You will always see some of them reading a book with title like “the right of American women” or the resemblance. As if they were Chief Gani Faweyinmi (SAN), they turn themselves to lawyers ‘apapan-dodo.’

But come to think of it, most of these women were nothing back home before they were brought to America. Gold-digger is the name of the game! Now that they got to America and those men washed away poverty from them, some of them will begin to misbehave knowing fully well that they can sustain themselves from their take home pay. For such a woman who cannot manage success, arrogance therefore, sets in so also is independence. The words “submissiveness to one’s husband” as proclaimed by God is no longer in their bible. Some of them will even tell you boastfully, I am an independent woman. Yoruba people have a way of saying it: ‘Ika kan kowo won ni idi mo!’ That is: one finger can no longer enter her anus again. As proud as they always are, they can no longer be subdued. They now set a new standard for themselves.

A woman who cannot buy even a pant and a bra on her own back home in Nigeria has been brought to America. She don open eye as my Warri people will say. The man has now opened her eyes. She has now moved from one extreme state to another – a once innocent lady has now grown wings all of a sudden. A lipstick has now been put on a pig. She now wants to go for SPA every week. She now spends money on magazines. She now wears designers. She does not want to receive any gift that is not a designer from her man. She now wears expensive colognes. She now eats out everyday. I am tired is the only song on her lip. “Dear, I cannot cook, let us go out to eat.” Some of them will say, dear, we rarely dine out these days. Eating out now becomes an everyday affair. If the man feels otherwise, she does not care a hoot. Threat as usual!

Some of them will even tell you to hire a helping hand to do the laundry and to help with house cleaning. This was the same woman who was fetching water from a river to wash her dresses and drying them in the sun, now, she cannot simply use washing machine by herself to do laundry without complaining. This was a woman who used to go to the sawmill or forest to fetch firewood before she cooked; now she cannot use cooker to cook without complaining. This was a woman who used to go to ‘under the bridge’ at Ojuelegba and Ikeja to do million braids and she was the same person who used to enter Molue to Badagry for the same million braids, but now she cannot even drive her own car, she wants to carry Taxi to a far place to do her hair where the celebrities go. She knows where Oprah and Beyonce do their hair; She knows where they do their nails. Competition galore! This is what Oprah recommended, she would say. ‘Iwo ke!’ I say this was a woman who used to go to “bend down” at Oshodi and Agege motor road to buy tokunbo dress; she now wants designers at the most expensive shopping mall. This was the same woman who did not know how to drive a car in Nigeria; she now wants to drive the most expensive cars. This was the same woman who used to go to the near-by bush and river to pass her excreta; she cannot now clean her own bathroom and toilet. What a dramatic change! My brothers and sisters, Yoruba people will say ‘O ga o!’

Some of our women who live in Europe will even leave Europe and tell their husbands that they want to go and shop in America as if American dresses or items are made differently. Some of them who their husbands are not in support of such trips will still embark on these trips. They just don’t want to hear anything that sounds as if their husbands are exercising some power. They will say, no one pays the piper and therefore, no one can call the tune. At least our women believe they are earning Pounds sterling and Euros like their husbands. ‘Na wa o!’ It is a tug of war at home.

Like a mature oak tree, she thinks she is now mature enough to fend for herself. She feels God has now buttered her bread. She now has both economic and other ‘bottom’ power.’ She has been taught now how to fish and instead of being thankful to that man, she will now begin to show her true colour. We all know what that colour is! Will God be happy with that kind of woman? Is that the woman you once knew?

Some of these women will be using the latest cars in town while their husbands are there using “one old jalopy” car just to make the family break-even. If her man advises her against huge debt, she is quick to tell the man, my God is not a God of poverty. Mr. Man, you are not the poorest man in America. Let us buy what we want; we will pay the debt off little by little. The Yorubas among them are quick to say, ‘emi to ba je igbese lo ma san.’ Loans upon loans they collect! If the man advises her against such a debt, she will complain about how she never has any saying in the family decision that the man is the only one making all the decisions. But alas, she has never made any good decision to start with. She never understands one day. She wants it all. That immediate gratification is what some of our women want. Some of them do not think ahead. Some of them don’t even make any useful plan with their husbands. “I want it now and it must be now” is the only expression in their dictionary. Some of these women don’t understand anything. They cannot see beyond their noses. Some of them are of the habit of wasting their husbands’ money on unnecessary wants. ‘Dear, I want these and I want that.’ Insincere ‘dear’ that they say so perfunctorily. They spend money on things they don’t need. Fortunately for them, their men’s wings have either been cut or pruned because of the laws that support and protect the women abroad.

I knew a woman who was wasting her husband money on useless items and parties and she was using her own money to build houses back home in Nigeria unknown to the man. Is that love? Will God be happy with this kind of behaviour? I know a particular woman who also built a house in Nigeria without telling her husband and she used her husband’s money to embark on such a project. This particular woman has already called 911 for her husband once. Even when the man heard that his woman has a mansion in Nigeria, he could not say anything. Can he? No, they say once bitten, twice shy. The man must have remembered how he was ordered out of his own house then and how the police told him not to go near his house within a 500 meter radius. How can a man forget such a horrible experience? Even if that woman builds a castle in Dubai today, that man cannot say anything.

Many of our women operate different bank accounts back home unknown to their husbands. If the man gets to hear from grapevine and asks her, it is the usual threat he gets in return. The man has been reduced to a toothless bull-dog that can only bark but which cannot bite. Truly enough, some of those men cannot even bark. How can he bark when the lion is there roaring? Who is talking that the dog is wagging its tail? Those women freely send their men on errand they cannot even send their own brothers. Why keep a dog and bark yourself, they would say? There was one particular woman who was telling me about an incident that happened in their home when her own mother came to visit them abroad. The woman as usual was ordering her dog (sorry, her husband) around on errand but the man’s mother-in-law had to caution her own daughter on this. But that woman told me she simply corrected her own mother that in this day and age, what a woman should do, a man can do better. With that, the woman had simply told her mother to leave her marriage alone. So sad!

Furthermore, it is another story entirely if anyone is visiting from the man’s side. Some women will do anything humanly possible to prevent such a visit. They are so smart at this; they are trying to prevent their husband relatives from seeing how they have turned their dear son into slave in Oyinbo-man’s land. It is that time she will start making unnecessary demands. At that point, the man surely will get the message that she does not want his mother or father to visit. If the man is tired of being a slave in a Whiteman’s land and tells his wife to let them go back to Nigeria. The woman will never put her signature to that ‘move’, never! Any man out there, just test your wife by saying that you are in the process of getting a job in Nigeria so that you guys can go back home, you will see her reaction! “Are you out of your mind; my hand no dey there.” She will say.

If some men want to send things to their families, it will pass through a whole screening process and the eagle eyes of their women but some of these women send things to their own families every month without any hassle. She only smiles to her husband when she wants something. If the man cannot afford it, it is one insult or another she heaps on him. Most of the time, it degenerates to a situation where the woman will say she is not happy. “You are not happy with the relationship just now that your husband cannot meet your excessive demands?” God dey! Most of these women are quick to say: “Your mates in town are doing these or that for their wives. Mr. Chinedu in my office just threw a party for his wife and he also gave her a Lexus Jeep as a birthday gift” ‘Mr. Taiwo in our church just bought a new house for his in-law back in Nigeria.” They all have juicy stories to share just to drive the man crazy.” But, this is the same woman who has been wasting her husband money on useless items and party. Anyway, it is women world out there.

To make matter worse, when there is a rift between the husband and the wife, the in-laws at home or abroad sometimes add fuel to the fire. Because of their own selfishness, some in-laws even fan the flames. They know that if the husband and the wife are not in good terms, it is of advantage to them. The people that should know better will now be the ones taking advantage of the couple and the rift. They can now get more ‘milk & kola’ if you know what I mean!

Before I forget, let me quickly talk about those people that Pastor Femi Awodele referred to as Turkeys in his article (Pastor Femi Awodele’s article). Well, since that man cannot always meet his wife incessant demands, we all know, that a woman will always complain. I have heard a woman telling me that her husband is a good for nothing husband. As far as I am concerned and from what I have seen, her husband is a good man. I knew this man and I saw all that this man was doing for her that many men will never do for their wives, yet she denigrates this man in the public. On querying her further why she said that her husband is not a good man she could not give me any genuine reason. It was one flimsy excuse or the other. I then said to myself, if I were to be one of those “Turkeys” now, I could have simply poured some sand in her marriage. It is a matter of just giving her my time and being her adviser. A woman like that will always come back to you for more advice because she will think that she has now found an ally.

That brings me to another point, women are the weaker sex emotionally and when they come abroad they want to make new friends. But they should know that the people or families who they are friendly with matter most. In most cases, they tend to mingle with these older women or couples who have been on ground. These older couples are Mr. and Mrs. ‘Abroad’ on their own. They know it all. They have been staying overseas for years. They go by different names: Uncle, aunty, Sister, mummy, daddy, you name it. We all do, I know you too have Turkeys. You are not related but you called them some of those names listed above just to honour them and just because they are Nigerians like you and they are older than you. Like I said, these newly landed couple always fall a prey to these “Turkeys”. Women will always show their emotion whenever they have little quarrel with their husbands. Men know how to bottle things up but women on the other hand needed someone to talk to especially when there are no any blood relatives around. But what happen when a shoulder we think we can cry on is full of thorns. Some of these Turkeys or hawks know how to put spanners on any marriage. They are very handy! And they go about all the time with their chisels and machine tools looking for marriage to demolish.

How do you know a Turkey, one would ask? From my own definition, a Turkey is anyone who you lodge a complaint to about your spouse’s ‘bad’ behaviour and who does not make any attempt to talk to your spouse on your behalf in order to help you pour oil on the troubled water. A turkey rather than being supportive to help you nurture your marriage will rather form alliance with you against your spouse. A Turkey will give you ill advice to the extent that you will even consider leaving your husband in matter of days. Those Turkeys or hawks know how to sugar-coat you into believing that you are better looking than your husband who brought you from home. They will cook for you and they will indirectly turn you into a slave especially if you know how to plait or braid hair or if you are good at cooking. They will talk you into leaving your husband and that they will help you get a better man who will take good care of you. They will even introduce another man to you. Some of those Turkeys will even advise you to go and study Nursing. They will prepare a timeline schedule for you and what you need to do at every stage. To the detriment of your marriage, they will advise you wrongly and they will ‘dabaru’ all the other good plans that you and your husband have, unfortunately, unknown to the husband. Some of our women do gossip about their husbands while in the saloon and they get ill advice in return. When the husband is away trying to look for what his members of family will eat, his woman is there making calls to those “Turkeys” out there, gossiping about her husband. ‘My husband is this, my husband is that.’ She complains.

At the advanced stages, as a senseless woman that she is, upon getting home after being brainwashed by her so-called Turkeys she will be doing some funny things just to annoy her husband. She now has the gut and liver to do what she cannot do before. She has the backing of her non-related uncle, mummy and daddy who were never in the picture at the beginning.

Eventually, the woman will move out. Or she will order her man to move out that she does not want to see him around. It is an order! That ‘separation’ has now occurred. The police as usual will wade in given the husband a refraining order from seeing his woman. The woman in turn will say I need my space. I need time to think about everything. Dancing to the tune of her newly found lover, she is indirectly telling her husband, now her Ex. that she needed time to taste another ‘soup.’ While the husband is wallowing in agony and his heart is broken, his wife is there receiving a holy treatment from her new man. She has now lost her heart to a new man. As usual, these kind of women always surround themselves with bad-wagons, the white bitches (sorry, some white-women). These white women who are her friends never help matter as well as they teach our women all the tricks of the trades called ‘separation and divorce.’ “Yes, if you don’t love him again, leave him and go and enjoy yourself with the person you now love.” The white bitches would say. To these white women, divorce is nothing to them as some of them have gone through separation and divorce more than three times already. They now change men like dresses. But some of our Nigerian women always forget the fact that our culture is so different from theirs. Yorubas say: ‘eni awi fun, oba je ko gbo!’ They say easy comes easy goes. After all said and done, her newly found lover will eventually leave her in the lurch after tasting the forbidden fruit repeatedly. Yorubas say. ‘iwaju ko se lo mo, eyin ko se pada si.’ Now she has lost it all. Because of pride, she will not be able go back to her ex and meanwhile, her new lover would have cut her off like a sharp knife. The other potential lovers will now be trooping after her like locusts without any good intentions but to chomp and clean mouth.

Some of these women are also members of one gang (occultism) or the other. Witchcraft is a better name for it. This is always very apparent in their “witch on a broomstick” behaviour. Some will even join witchcraft or bad gang because of their men. They will say they want to deal ruthlessly with their men. A friend of mine was even telling me about how his own sister left her husband and how she eventually turned to an object that every Tom and Harry exchange like trade by batter. Because the woman is now depressed having lost it all, she wants to be loved again. Our men and their white counterparts alike know how to deal with these types of women. Some of our men are often seen selling the woman’s weak point to their friends. ‘Go and meet her, tell her this and that, she will fall for you.’ Like free food, they will all use such a woman in rapid succession and drop her each time like it is hot. “You want to be wayward, we will help you.” These men would say. The most unfortunate thing is that those Turkey will now abandon the lady when things get out of hand. Such a depressed woman can also do just anything. This depression can even lead the woman to kill as well. It’s not only men that can kill, women too can kill. To such women out there, all is not lost. Even though these Turkeys may have now disappeared to the thin air, I say all is not lost. To such women out there facing this kind of problem, I will advise you move closer to God. He will deliver you. You need rest!

Having lost it all to the divorce (his house, his car, his wife, the money in the account, the children and most especially his mind) the man on the other hand, becomes so depressed and he may not do well at work again and may lose his job eventually. Some of his friends may even alienate or abandon him. Nigerians! Success mingles with success they say. Now, that his friends, sisters and brothers have run away from him, he is more psychologically disturbed. Upon all of these, they may still ask the man to pay a child support or alimony. Now, my brothers and sisters, what do you expect from such a man? I don’t expect less from such a wounded lion! Hence, the killing spree we are witnessing today. But common Mr. Man, there are some people who have survived this divorce related depression. There are some strong men out there who never allow it to get to that stage that they are now depressed. Go out go do things that will make you happy. Engage yourself in so many activities. Meet people and be happy. I know some people who their wives left them. Because their women left, it toughened them and made them work even harder. Now today, they are fine and well to do people while those women are having the regret of their lives. It is law of karma! You can actually turn the table around. The storm will soon be over. Don’t go and kill! Don’t waste people lives. And don’t waste your own life too. Remember the Ten Commandments -Thou shall not kill! Don’t kill yourself because of one Nurse who cannot manage success. Even, some celebrities are still submissive to their husbands! Anyway, they say empty barrels make the greatest noise.

To our men in this kind of painful experience, rather than planning to kill someone they should also know that there are a lot of women out there waiting to accept them. Those prospective wives will even be spending money on you. You were the one spending money on your wife before but those women I am talking about will spoil you with goodies. They will do everything for you. They are even better in every way. Better jobs, better characters, better everything. Godly women! Potential wives! They need you and not your money. Unfortunately, our men close their eyes to all of these opportunities while looking for people to hold a pity party for them. I don’t pity them!

What am I saying here, to any man out there who is passing through a stage like this, please don’t resort into killing your wife. The coast will soon be clear. Let her go; you will find another good woman who will be there for you for better for worse. God sees everything and just allow Him to give you rest and peace. A man does not have to do anything as revenge. Just allow our God to avenge for you. The killing spree is not necessary.

These Turkeys are you and me! Look at yourself in the mirror. Are you one of those Turkeys?

Before I go, I will like to appeal to those ‘Turkeys’ out there, Uncles, aunty, mummy and daddy, brothers and sisters, let us help these young couples to nurture their marriages. You live with your own spouse, let them enjoy their own marriage, the God ordained institution.

To my brothers and sisters out there, I want to also tell you here that you should not allow anybody to paint a rosy picture of family life or ideal marriage for you. My brothers and sisters, do not be deceived by anyone, there is no perfect marriage anywhere. Everybody is trying everyday to make it work. We all put in efforts to water it to make it grow. You may say you don’t like your spouse but – give the devil his/her due – he/she works incredibly hard. Stick and stay glued to your spouse. The devil you know now is better than the devil you don’t know. Don’t give that new devil a chance. There is no master or servant in a marriage. Let us give ourselves a level of respect for God to be happy with us.

Before I get to the finishing line, I will like to say that the characters being painted in this article may be you or people that you know. They are all out there. Let us scrutinize or check ourselves out and try to turn over a new leaf. I can only say so much. My main objective is not to belittle our women here. It is not character assassination at all but an appeal for a reformed character. In the bible, there are good women and there are bad ones. But which one do you want to be? There was Priscilla as well as Jezebel. Therefore, not all our women are bad eggs or black sheep. I have seen many Nigerian women abroad who are so good to their husbands. These are the women I want to know. I even knew some Nigerian medical doctors (women) abroad. Their modesty forbids them from bragging about their success. These women never looked down on their husbands. They allowed their husband to be the head. They respect them and also they are very submissive. They don’t compete with their husbands. They don’t drive their husbands crazy. Excellent character reference, you name it! These are the qualities of a good woman!