Dowry non-payment ends 17 years old affair

Mutinta Mulaye writes

THE Boma Local Court in Lusaka refused to divorce a couple that had been cohabiting for 17 years because the man did not pay dowry.

This was a case in which Christopher Mwale, a security guard, sued his partner Fostina Tembo, a maid of Ngombe Township, for divorce citing problems in the relationship.

Mr Mwale told senior local court magistrate Petronella Kalyelye that problems in their marriage began after he lost his job because Ms Tembo changed and started having an affair.

“I was working as a garden boy and I fought for her to be employed at the same work place. I later lost my job and my wife changed. One time we went to court and we were reconciled,’ Mr Mwale said.

“It seemed she had a boyfriend because she would run to the toilet or outside to answer it whenever her phone rung though she would usually say it was from her boss,” Mr Mwale said.

In 2012, I just got home and found her packing stuff in a truck. I later found a man at the place she moved to and people told me she stayed with him,” he said.

Ms Tembo, in her defense, told court when she eloped with Mr Mwale, she did not know the kind of man he until he started bringing different women to their home.

“He would go drinking and return with a woman and sleep with her in the sitting room while I am in the bedroom. Another woman came home one time and asked me who I was claiming she was his wife. She said she was pregnant from him and asked me to leave,” Ms Tembo said.

“I never left because I didn’t have where to go so we stayed with her for a while. He was chased from where we worked from because of his heavy drinking. He left me and shifted but when his money finished he came back. We moved to a one roomed house where I suffered because all he did was drink,” she said.

“He used to steal my money, disappear and switch off his phone. My boss would help provide support to my child because Mr Mwale is a fool. He would go drinking and come back shirtless, with bruises all over his body,” Ms Tembo said.

She said her husband would at times desert home for days and only returned when he was broke.

“One time he got all my money after I got paid, left my pay slip on the bed, packed all his clothes in my suitcase and disappeared. The money was hidden but he managed to find it. His relatives told me to leave him but I stayed on. He would even send our child to steal my money for him,” Ms Tembo said.

The court could not grant the divorce because the two were just cohabiting as dowry was never paid.