27-year-old housewife seeks dissolution of 13-year-old marriage

A 27-year-old housewife has asked an Ado-Ekiti customary court to dissolve her 13-year-old marriage to her husband, Azeez Solomon.

The woman, who resides at Fabian Hotel, along Ilawe road in Ado-Ekiti, told the court that she had made efforts to make the union work but Solomon had been impossible.

According to her, her husband was not performing his responsibilities in the family. The mother of three said she was the one paying the children’s school fees until last year, when he took over. Favour said whenever her husband misbehaved and she pointed it out, he would retort, saying he would kill her and nothing would happen. She added that whenever they had sexual intercourse, her husband would demand for the cloth she used to clean up, saying she found that strange and had to stop him from having sex with her.

The woman alleged Solomon was fond of patronising a herbalist, especially when he was ill, and fond of bringing black soap to the home. Favour said her husband wouldn’t allow her access to his room, which he allegedly locked all the time.

Admitting that Solomon assisted her financially when she started her business of selling phones and accessories, she said he, however, asked her to leave the shop he had offered her for the business when her business boomed. “He said I was disturbing him, whereas it was the business I was using to maintain the children. I pleaded with him but he refused,” she said.

Favour maintained she was no more interested in the union and wanted custody of the children – Marvelous, 9, and Christian, 5, both boys, and Mercy, 2, a female. Forty-year-old Solomon, a resident of No. 2, Omisanajan Street, Ado-Ekiti, said his wife was his sales girl when he met her and they both fell in love and decided to marry each other.

He added that even after the marriage, they didn’t separate the business between them. He said after the union, his wife started misbehaving, and denied her allegation that he was not paying the children’s school fees.

Solomon denied the allegation of non-access to his room, saying he still loved his wife and the court should plead with her on his behalf to come back home. The president of the court, Mrs Olayinka Akomolede, adjourned the case till October 24, 2019 for judgment.