Court ends 10-year-old marriage over wife’s stealing habit

A Customary Court sitting in Ikorodu, Lagos State, has dissolved a 10-year-old marriage because the wife’s perpetual stealing habit, infidelity and stubbornness.

The petitioner, Olawale Akanji, a carpenter, had dragged his wife, Afusat, to the court, praying to be separated from the woman as she has, over the years, caused his series of embarrassment with her criminal activities and serial adultery, arguing that efforst to stop his 33-year-old wife from her bad habits have been fruitless.

The 34-year-old Akanji further said he could no longer continue to live with his hairdresser wife due to her unruly behavior and thieving character.

In the application filed at the court in October 2014, the Igbo, Ikorodfu based Akanji, urged the court to grant the divorce to save his sanity, stating that he decided on the action when he found out that his wife allegedly pregnant for another man as well as being in the habit of stealing his money.

But Afusat denied the allegations leveled against her in her evidence:

“I don’t steal my husband’s money, even though he is very tight fisted. He gives us N300 feeding allowance daily and I will be the one to feed his old-aged mother and father that lived with us. I usually fetch water for sale, that’s where I get money to feed the family.

He was always thinking that I am stealing his money or I have been engaging in extra- marital affairs, please help me save my marriage.”

But the President of the Court, Olu Adebiyi, noted that there was no more love in the union and that the couple could not stay together amicably despite moves made by the court to reconcile them. He therefore dissolved the marriage and Akanji to register the pregnant Afusat in an ante natal clinic and pay accommodation fees to the her since the paternity of the pregnancy cannot be established now until a DNA test proves its ownership after delivery.