To say today's Nigeria is a country of agitation is not out of place. Some of the demands and clamours emanating from various sections of the nation, such as the review of our resource sharing formula and the devolution of power, are valid.
Others are outrageous and unfeasible. Boko Haram's anti-Western education creed and hints at secession in some quarters fall into the latter category.
However, there is an amusing, undisruptive and rather bizarre agitation filtering in through the ancient city of Kano. It is now official that there are over 1 million divorcees, widows and other single women of marriageable status in search of husbands there.
This group even has an umbrella body, the Voice of Widows, Divorcees and Orphans Association of Nigeria (VOWAN). Its spinster-in-chief, Hajiya Altine Abdullahi, is said to have been in the vanguard of "operation hook-up" since 2003. Ironically, close to a decade later, she is yet to be hooked.
But things may soon change for the senior spinsters of Kano. Their SOS supplication finally reached the Kano State government recently and its response brought joyful tidings to the VOWAN camp.
The compassionate and benevolent government of Dr Rabi'u Musa Kwankwaso came up with an ingenious marry-off plan similar to a public auction or trade in stock on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange.
Playing the role of the Securities and Exchange Commission is the Hisbah Board (or 'religious police'), which has announced an "initial public offering" (IPO) of 1,000 women to be married off in the first phase of the "recapitalisation" process. The board has commenced the sale of intention forms to suitable and qualified candidates.
Anxious and desperate, however, VOWAN members are beginning to express frustration at the slow pace of the grand plan.
Their worries are understandable; only 20 of them have been fixed in the first batch of the first phase, while another 100 are set to follow suit soon. And like other pressure groups, VOWAN has a solution.
It posited that if the Kano State government was truly committed to marrying them off, the governor, his deputy and other political officeholders should take its members as wives. This fair practice-what-you-preach should be made a state policy.
The Hisbah Board should expect us to laud a harem trade exhibition whose failure to factor in the causes of such an alarming rate of divorce in Kano discredits whatever good intention it possesses. For one, marrying away all those women - which is impossible - is not divorce-proof.
At best, they would only temporarily quit the marriage market only to return to it used, maltreated and frustrated, unless a typical Kano man treats his wife any better than his other assets, all of which are both replaceable and disposable?
Another point missed is that among those women, the majority only need husbands as a form of social security. Empower them and their numbers would drastically reduce.
http://allafrica.com/stories/201203191058.html
| Posted: at | |
TRENDING GISTS 
Arrest Tompolo Now! Nigerian Doctor Dares EFCC To Go After Niger Delta Militant Leader, Tompolo
Expect Davido Someday As Governor Of Osun – Formere Senator Ben Murray-Bruce Declares
Panic In Abuja As Pastor Shoots Two Immigration Officers After Being Mistaken Them For Robbers
Retired Teacher, Mallam Kabiru Killed, Wife Abducted As Bandits Invade Zamfara School Quarters
Army Busts Gunrunning Syndicate in Plateau, Two Arrested With AK-47 (Photos)
Ringside Rumble? Fans Hype Possible Boxing Showdown Between Small Doctor And Portable
16-Year-Old Maths Wizard, Olamide Aderibigbe Scores 336 Overall In UTME; Scores 98 in Maths