Court separates couple over incessant beating by husband

A Badagry customary court has heard how a husband allegedly turned his wife into a punching bag. The petitioner, 36-year-old petrol attendant, Mrs Rahman Oluremi, asked the court to dissolve her marriage, saying that her husband, Taofik Rahman, apart from “frequent beating, matrimonial irresponsibility, lack of respect for her parents, fetishism and no more love”, […]

A Badagry customary court has heard how a husband allegedly turned his wife into a punching bag.

The petitioner, 36-year-old petrol attendant, Mrs Rahman Oluremi, asked the court to dissolve her marriage, saying that her husband, Taofik Rahman, apart from “frequent beating, matrimonial irresponsibility, lack of respect for her parents, fetishism and no more love”, has not been giving her rest of mind.

The marriage between Rahman and Oluremi was contracted in 2002 and blessed with four children before the relationship went sour.

The petitioner said that her husband was jobless when they got married and they later moved to Port Harcourt when he got a job, but the husband was always beating her even during her first pregnancy.

She added that she returned to Badagry with their two children and the husband later came to join them when he lost his job, adding that it was her sister that was responsible for their accommodation and upkeep.

According to her, the beating continued while they were staying with her sister and he was also destroying her properties, which made them to leave her sister’s house within a year.

She said that her husband married one of his clients who had three children from her previous relationship, which she discovered during an unscheduled visit to her husband’s new house.

When the beating wouldn’t stop, she said, she reported the matter to the National Human Rights Commission, which she said advised her to go to the customary court.

But Rhahman, a 37-year-old computer engineer and Islamic cleric, said that Oluremi understood only money as reason for love.

He agreed that the divorce petition be granted as the petitioner was already married to another man, tendering pictures he downloaded from her social media platform to buttress his point.

The court president, Barrister Sikirudeen Adekola, held that the marriage cannot be resuscitated and the two parties should be allowed to go their separate ways in peace.