Is wife battering still fashionable?

It is rather shameful to see a modern man still subjecting his wife to beating and public disgrace. Some men, even the so-called well educated ones, don’t have the patience to tolerate women or patient enough to appreciate what women go through to act the way some of them do.To ill-tempered men, the solution is […]

It is rather shameful to see a modern man still subjecting his wife to beating and public disgrace.
Some men, even the so-called well educated ones, don’t have the patience to tolerate women or patient enough to appreciate what women go through to act the way some of them do.
To ill-tempered men, the solution is for them to vent their spleen on their wives no matter how fragile, or sickly they may be.  
Agreed, many women  are not fit to put up with and are incorrigibly poor in attitude and relationship. These are women that have given decent men who have striven to keep up life assorted and despicable names simply because they have become out of control due to such women’s distasteful mien.
Mr Timothy Nkopitem is a local contractor and government supplier in Calabar. He seems to regret that he has the misfortune of marrying a woman who has turned his life into a nightmare. Both have one little boy but the wife has a child in a previous relationship.  
Nkopitem told his story recently when he gave his woman the beating of her life.
“I have made a lifelong mistake because I made a very wrong choice of a woman for a life partner.  I had an array of choices but I thought Angela was the best of them not knowing she was a facade – her inside was very poor!
“These many years I have tried my best possible to care and provide for her yet she doesn’t seem satisfied.
“Every day early in the morning or often when I return from my business in the evening, she would become erratic and rain abuses on me even in the open. She would call me unprintable names, abuse my parents and threaten me. I can no longer bear with her. She is too temperamental.”
This day was one of the many days that both would fight from the bedroom to the open, and stripping themselves naked.
Of course, the husband would beat her to stupor, decorating her with marks all over.
Wearied co-tenants and neighbours have noted them having waded into their incompatibility several times. Anytime there is commotion in the neighbourhood their first reaction is suspicion that it is from the Nkopitems!
Angela, the wife, has said that the husband has neglected her, not giving her required attention; inadequate financial care and not accommodating her relatives as he does his.
“Is it not cheating that he does not pay me enough attention? He promised to send me for further studies but up till now he is not talking about it anymore. Every day he will pump money to his brothers, sponsor his own nephews at schools whereas none of mine is staying here with us and helping me. That is cheating.”
Another wife-beater is Julius Andrew (not real name).  He works at the airport as a supervisor. He is simple, friendly but has little tolerance for women! He has a woman who is from the middle belt  part of Nigeria whose education is average.
Neighbours dislike Julius for one thing: he batters his wife to no end.  Even in the middle of night, familiar sounds of yelling and violent slamming are often traceable to his apartment.
Here is a woman that shows much love and tolerance for Julius yet nobody knows what puts him off her most often and this would often end in him beating and kicking her and showing her nakedness to the world, according to their observers.
“I think something else takes possession of my husband sometimes. Otherwise I cannot understand why he beats me every day. I love him. He loves me but he seems not to be in control of himself when we have little disagreement that we can talk it over,” Sandra, Julius wife, told a local family counsellor.
It is very dangerous and shameful to beat or assault women, although women themselves deliberately attack or challenge the men through their nagging and mien.
Many international protocols have condemned domestic violence against women. Even, many parliaments in countries across the world have similarly enacted laws outlawing violence against women.
In the United States of America, Congress has passed two main laws related to violence against women Act and The Family Violence Prevention and Services Act. Over there, issue of wife battering is taken seriously and men are often jailed.
In Nigeria, the law against domestic violence is not very strong against men that assault women or  their wives. For instance, Section 360 of the Criminal Code provides that ,“Any person who unlawfully and indecently assaults a woman or girl is guilty of a misdemeanour, and is liable to imprisonment for two years.”
But the same Criminal Code discriminates against women on the issue of punishment against personal assaults. For instance, Section 353 of the Criminal Code provides that , “Any person who unlawfully and indecently assaults any male person is guilty of a felony, and is liable to imprisonment for three years. The offender cannot be arrested without warrant.”
Commissioner for Women Affairs in Cross River State, Mrs Idak Iwuchukwu re-echoed the advice of Deaconess Grace David Irefin who now heads the BCS Universal Women Fellowship based in  Calabar, saying ,  “as the keepers of the wellbeing of the home, our women should endeavour to sacrifice anything for peace and survival of their homes.”
Addressing a large crowd of women recently in Calabar, Irefin charged women to put up befitting character in the home. She said women should be patient, truthful and humble, assuring that these can melt the hardest stone.
Apostle Tom Inyang Akpan is a former banker and former International chairman of Blessed Brothers and Sisters Fellowship, a marriage counselling faith-based group, funded by Brotherhood of the Cross and Star, a spiritual movement founded by Leader Olumba Olumba Obu.
He has condemned domestic violence and rampant divorces amongst married couples.  He said people have today allowed innuendos to distract and invade their marriages. This is one major reason that has made otherwise solid marriages to collapse, he contends.
“Married couples should have their marriages blessed and allow the spirit of God to dominate their union. Where there is humility in marriage, openness, peace, mutual respect, understanding and forgiveness; where there is no foreign interference in a blessed marriage it is very doubtful that violence can snake into it.”
He cautioned husbands given to maltreating their wives to beware as women are the vehicles that convey powerful beings into the earth plane.