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Ozioma Onyenweaku
There have been a lot of outcries over the rate of domestic violence in recent times. Some get to the news. Some do not. Most that get to the news come out scary and most times life has been lost.
One of those that made the news recently in Nigeria is that of Pius of Channels TV and Dr. Ifeyinwa.
My special attention has been drawn to the case of Dr. Ifeyinwa and her journalist husband, Pius, for obvious reasons. Her story has been that her six years of marriage to her husband had been painful experience of domestic violence; she has four children with one being just 4 weeks old. She had the birth through caesarian section. She advised her husband to stop spending recklessly on women but to save for the training of their children. The husband pounced on her, sat on her stitches (from the caesarian section) and tried strangling her while the children were there screaming. She made a video of her bruised face and posted on social media. It went viral.
I read a lot of the reactions from people as this news of domestic violence hit the social media. Some, mostly women, demanded that she left the home; some asked why she was still in the house and had not left. Few outrightly condemned the violent act. I share some of the different reactions below.
- She must have brought out the criminal in this man. Some married women today are delialah o”
- Why must we help an adult to leave the fire? Imagine a medical doctor disgracing her profession
- You are exposing yourself to the public, most others suffer worse than what you see
- We must learn to be discreet and not to expose ourselves at every domestic problem
- No matter the offence this is not acceptable
- Sorry oo! Is a pity. Just communicate your marriage into the hand of God; God will definitely take control in a way that you will ‘marvled’ And do not let your children to begin to hate their father so that the marriage will not collapse.
- You want Channels to sack him and you will expect him to provide for the family
- I am sure he has been doing good to her and her parents but not disseminating on social media
- She is African. In Africa, infact in Igbo tradition, woman no dey commot from husband’s house. If you can’t change igbo tradition then I don’t see the need for all this. So you want her to leave her husband? Wahala be like kite.
I actually marveled at some of the reactions. From most the male folks that reacted only very few outrightly condemned the violent act of Mr. Pius as having no justification whatsoever.
Who says it is an African tradition to batter a wife? Granted, it was, and still is in some areas, a thing frowned at for a married woman to run back to her parents’ house. But many women have been lost in the process. Are we still to tow that line? What would make a man batter a woman who has just had a baby barely 4 weeks through caesarian operation?
What marriage will a dead married woman have saved when she dies in the marriage? I believe strongly in the sanctity and preservation of marriage but not at the risk of anyone’s life. God holds accountable anyone who is in a position to protect life but fails to do so; and that includes one’s own life.
Preservation of children’s mental and emotional health is one of the top reasons why a woman would do well to leave an abusive marriage. Children who witness domestic violence not just become violent themselves but are also messed up mentally and emotional growing up.
Acknowledging that most women go through worse forms of violence without speaking up, does it make it right?
Well, I am happy that a governor has reconciled them; but asking the woman to quickly move back to the house does not settle well with me because of certain experiences I know of. The young man Pius might be needing help himself. He could be under some mental and emotional stress. So recommending and sending him for psychological evaluation would have been the first step.
A man who sat on his wife’s stitches after few weeks of the stitches definitely did not mean well for the woman; and I do not believe the young man would desire death for his young beautiful wife. Who takes care of the four little lovely kids!
Without the psychological evaluation, Pius might become violent again, and this time it might be deadly. To say ‘God forbid’ we must do the needful.