KFB's Today In Court: Man drags wife to court for refusing to bear his surname

For our new readers, the KFB's Today In Court, is a weekly Friday column, where we bring you the most controversial court case witnessed during the week by Kemi Filani Blog.
No longer able to condone his wife’s penchant for calling him names, a middle aged Nigerian civil servant, Johnson Munago, has prayed a grade A Customary Court, Igando, Lagos to sever his two year old marriage with his estranged wife, Helen Munago.

The petitioner, Johnson Munago, told the court that aside her constant use of abusive words on him, Helen has also refused to bear his name.

“She always tells me that she is comfortable with her father’s name and that she cannot change it. And that I am a foolish man. In fact that is the name she addresses me with, ‘this foolish man” Munago said.

Stating more reasons he wants to opt out of the young union, Johnson, accused Helen of being a night crawler and too demanding, adding that she insisted that he should rent her a flat and be giving her N10,000 weekly allowance, failing which she would go back to her parent’s house.

“If I ask her where she was coming from at that time, she would tell me I had no right to know where she was coming from. When the issue of the money arouse, I tried to explain that I don’t have money to rent a flat; she opened up by telling me that she agreed to marry me just to solve her personal problem. She said that she was once diagnosed of a womb ailment at the hospital after examination and that the doctor advised her to get pregnant as soon as possible. She told me that it was over since she had gotten what she wanted. She packed out of our apartment since January 16 with my one and half-year-old son to an unknown destination,” he said.

He urged the court to dissolve the union as he no longer loved her.

Helen, the 35-year-old housewife, denied the allegations, saying that her husband was stingy and did not take care of her and her son.

“The money he used to drop for feeding is not always enough so I told him to increase it,” she said.

She told the court to grant her husband’s wish because she was no longer interested in the marriage.

After listening to both parties, the court members told the respondent to bring the only child of the union for sighting at the next hearing.

He adjourned the case for further hearing.