Akalites call for unified “marriage list” and bride price in Umuaka.
3 min read
The “students” of Umuaka Times Institute UTI, the whatsapp group of Umuaka Times newspaper last week made a unanimous call to harmonize the “marriage list” and the bride prices presented and paid in different towns of Umuaka Ebe Iri during marriage negotiations and ceremonies. The call was made by a good number of Akalites during a weekly online debate program UTI organizes for her students.
During the debate, all who contributed their views agreed that the cost of marriage ceremonies and rituals in Umuaka is exceedingly very high and called on each autonomous community to establish a marriage committee to help put an end to such a development. Before the consensus was reached, there were diverse opinions by some of the contributors who viewed the topic from devise angles.
A Consultant Gynecologist and Public Health Physician Professor Kingsley Obioha who made huge contributions during the debate totally disagreed with other contributors that there would be a uniformed bride price and “marriage list” in Umuaka. According to the university don, it will be unreasonable and a bashing to the efforts made by parents to give away their daughters in marriage for peanuts all in the name of achieving a unified marriage list and pride price in Umuaka.
Professor Obioha articulated his views thus: “This cannot be done. How do you expect parents who have heavily invested millions in the upbringing and education of their daughters to the university level to give them away at N2000 in the name of marriage?”
In order to drive home his point, Professor Obioha gave the following illustration: “This is like shoes which have categories. When you go to a market to buy shoes, there are shoes for N2000, N10, 000, N50,000 and more. All you need to do is to buy the one you can afford that also falls into your category.”
The controversial Professor maintained that women like shoes, have categories too. Some others who disagreed with the erudite professor submitted that the purpose of marriage is for the woman to give birth to children. Adding education to it is not a part of it. Those on this line of the argument described the picture painted by the professor as a side attraction.
Another university don, Dr Uche Nnuji who also spoke during the debate out rightly disagreed with Professor Obioha and warned the students of UTI not to pollute the Igbo cultural marriage institution with academic honours.
By the time the debate which started by 8 pm and lasted till the early hours of the following day came to an end, Professor Obioha made the closing remarks and thanked all that took part in the discourse. The professor ignited another controversial argument when he said that giving women out in marriage is a systematic and approved way of selling them. Till date many people still disagree with him.
Several contributors who spoke or made presentations during the debate seriously frowned that the high cost of marriage ceremonies in Umuaka community has created a very deep problem in the society of Umuaka. They eventually suggested the establishment of marriage committees in all the autonomous communities in Umuaka.
