Last week’s piece, ‘The next-of-kin’, generated a lot of interest. Why was Auntie Funke speaking for only women? Why don’t women make their husbands their next-of-kin? Then a professor of Philosophy called and for almost 30 minutes we discussed the matter. Here’s one of his conclusions that got me: A man whose marriage has been his prison all his life is not likely to make his wife his next-of-kin in his will. Who can blame him? If a man did not enjoy love, faithfulness and loyalty from his wife, how is he supposed to trust her in death? Only men who trust their wives entrust their estates to their widows.
I agree, really, but that angle is deep, very deep. Imagine this: a man leaves all his properties, his entire estate to his brother or his sister, because all his life, his marriage was a trap, a prison. He stayed in the marriage, didn’t throw his wife out or walk away. He had children with her but decided to wait until death did them part to have the last laugh.
Doesn’t that mean he was mean or vindictive or just patient but vengeful. I’m confused. What is the difference between six and half-a-dozen? A man who waits till death to deal that kind of blow is a bad, very bad man. Okay. So, I’m taking the side of women again. Sorry, I apologise.
Let us look at it from the man’s angle. His wife can cook and clean house but is insatiable in bed. Their libido don’t match. He wants less, she wants more. So she starts ‘cutting shows’ by the side. She actually became so careless that she brought home two children that were not her husband’s. Yes, the man did DNA and two of ‘his children’ did not check out. Was he sad? More than sad. He didn’t even discover until this external children who had called him Dad all their lives were undergraduates of the most expensive private university in Nigeria.
All kinds of evil thoughts raced round his head: “Poison the children. Kick them out and stop paying their school fees and indeed all their bills. Then he thought “was it really their fault that their mother was a shameless ‘animashaun’?
‘Kick the woman out with the external children?’
That would serve her right, right or wrong? It will also leave him with a lot of explanations to do. It will expose his not-so-greatness in bed. It will embarrass his other ‘non-bastard’ children, his church, his siblings, his friends. Too much ‘salaye’.
He eventually decides to seek solace elsewhere and in other things. He will deal with the deathly blow later when he would no longer be available for the hot seat. So he died and left everything to his next-of-kin, his younger brother, to show his disgust for his cheating wife. He left the family house to his sister, he left detailed instructions without revealing the secret of his wife’s indiscretion.
So, was he wrong to have stayed in his gilded cage all his life and then pull the rug from under his wife’s feet in death?
Should a man manage a marriage that gives him pain and anguish just so the society will continue to believe he’s happily married?
Whatever the answer, at least, now, we have established that the choice of a wife as a next-of-kin can be influenced by the kind of marriage a man has had as at the time he was writing his last testament.
The other lesson here is that even when a man refuses to name his wife as his next-of-kin and chooses to name his brother, it does not mean he totally trusts his siblings, just that he’ll rather entrust his estate, the future of his wealth and children to him than a cheating wife.
For those who think the next-of-kin issue ought to be a two-way street, I feel you but I plead with you to reassess your stand. Let us attempt to answer these questions together:
When death occurs in the family, who is usually accused of killing the deceased? Husband or wife?
When it’s time to swear at the shrine, who is usually dragged there? The man or the woman?
In some cultures, whose head is shaven? The husband or the wife?
Who is locked up in a room for days with a corpse to prove her innocence?
Who is often thrown out of the family property and left to cater for the children?
Who observes the longest season of mourning, wearing black or white for months?
Who is encouraged to quickly remarry? And who is accused of witchcraft, indecency, promiscuity for going on a date, even one year after the death of the spouse?
Swear with your little finger that you answered these questions honestly. Even as you read this, you know that I did not ask all the questions involved here. Do you now see why women need more protection and empowerment when they become widow, especially when the children are still young?
When the head of the family dies, it is the women who need all the help they can get, because when death forces them to land, they do not land softly on sofa. They land hard on a hard floor, on their bare buttocks with those who should rally and help her watching from afar, suspicious, judging. You can’t imagine it yet. Let me bring the picture closer to you.
Imagine the fresh widow is your sister, your daughter. She’s young, her three children are in primary school. She’s being accused of witchcraft. In fact, they are saying she has ‘seven birds’. Her brothers-in-law have arrived to lock up the house because their late brother made one of them his next-of-kin, instead of his wife, your sister, your daughter.
Is the picture clearer now? Are you moving your sister in with you and your wife to provide for her and give her shelter? Is your daughter moving back home with you?
Then there is the issue of why women don’t use their husbands as next-of-kin? It’s dangerous, really. That’s why, when a widow is next-of-kin, even if she remarries, her children almost always retain prime position in her life. An estate left to a mother is an estate that will be protected for her children, especially when those children are still young.
There are plenty of good men, great fathers out there but a widower who used to have many girlfriends as next-of- kin? A serial cheat, though loving father as next-of-kin? Women fear and you must agree that there’s reason to be afraid. Even when a woman can trust her husband, can she trust his new wife or mistress or string of side chics? Definitely not the way you can trust a widow to look after her children and their inheritance. Think deeply about these things.
