He prefers going to public places to disgrace me,wife tells court

· It is true that I used to correct her in the public —Husband

An independent Sharia court sitting at Ojaoba in Ibadan, Oyo State, has dissolved an 11-year-old marriage over the husband’s constant molestation of the wife.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reported that the housewife, Kudirat Shitu, had alleged that her husband, Taoheed, was in the habit of constantly molesting and victimising her in public.

In his judgement, the court’s president, Sheikh Hamad Tirimisiyu, held that all efforts by the court to amicably resolve the disagreement in consonance with Islamic laws failed.

Consequently, the court granted the applicant’s application and ordered her to refund the N1, 200 bride price because she requested for the divorce.

The court awarded custody of the first two grown up children to the husband, while Kudirat was asked to take custody of the last two.

Tirimisiyu ordered Taoheed to pay N9,000 monthly feeding allowance for the upkeep of the two children with her.

In her petition, Kudirat said Taoheed brought her under his bondage in 2005 when he forcibly impregnated her.

“As a result, I had four children with him and this brought me hardship and agony.

“To say the least, victimisation and molestation have the order of the day since marrying him.

“Rather than correcting me within our living room, Taoheed preferred going to the public places to disgrace me.

“In addition to this, he does not make any provision for my feeding and the four children, but prevents people who want to render any assistance from doing so.

“Worse still, he does not hesitate to turn me into a punching bag anytime he has the opportunity of doing so.

“In fact, clothing our nakedness is a tall order for him because he is a jobless man.

“My lord, I want to be released from his bondage,” Kudirat pleaded with the court.

Taoheed, in his defence, denied allegation of irresponsibility, saying that he provided for the family within his limited resources.

He testified that, “Kudirat is such a disobedient wife who had no regard for instructions.

“It is true that I used to correct her in the public, but that is when I would have done everything possible in the room to correct her.

“I discovered that Kudirat had been tarnishing my image before all sorts of people and she’s such a troublesome woman.

“She fought with a landlord’s daughter and seriously injured her, and I paid heavily for it in the hospital and for her not to be jailed,” Shitu told the court.