Someone shocked me when he said that there is nothing like adultery in Africa. The reason being that men in Africa were ‘allowed’ to marry more than one wife; and even if they were caught cheating, they were not reprimanded like the women with which they were having intercourse with. That explains why most men would be having sex here and there and not even tolerate their wives to smile at another man.
An expert once said that it is women that give men the hand with which to treat them. A mother in-law is ready to defend her son for having affairs with other women; she even gives him more kudos should he tell her he was trying out if he could get a male child from such extra-marital unions. Which woman would be in the shoes of her daughter in-law and not be sad? Besides, any married woman who sleeps around with men does so at her peril because it is her fellow women who would tear her apart and send her packing.
Moreover, most of the women with whom these men are having affairs with know fully well that these men are married; some even know their wives. Yet they decide to go into it. No wonder some men easily threaten their wives with divorce saying ‘after all there are many women out there’. For us Africans, these wives have no option than to swallow various inhuman acts from their husbands to save their marriage.
In good will, every woman should do well to put herself in the shoes of the other woman. If you are a mother in-law, do not be a living hell for your daughter in-law. Do not support your son for engaging in extra-marital unions. Again, if you are not married (or even married) do not have extra-marital affairs with another woman’s husband.
Yet, experts have said that the actions of a mother in-law towards her daughter in-law are often carried forward by the daughter in-law when she too becomes a mother in-law. So if this way of life is innate in women, should women not apply reason and become more loving to one another? Some women say that men find it hard to be good to them, but how much have women tried to be good to one another?
I am optimistic that women are truly the harbingers of love. It is the love with which they nurtured you and me that we are able to love others. Let them not disappoint those who trust in their maternal instinct of considering others first.
