An Ibadan-based nurse, Sukurat Adewale, was all tears on Friday before a customary court sitting in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, while alleging that her husband, Adewunmi Adewale, deceived her into aborting 15 pregnancies she had for him but later abandoned her and their three children in his rented apartment.
Sukurat said her investigation revealed that Adewale had married two other wives in different locations in Ibadan, and pleaded with the court to grant her custody of the three children she had for him.
Sukurat, who was responding to a divorce petition Adewale had filed before the court, said her husband was in the habit of absconding their matrimonial home and would return home with different ailments.
She said, “I am not interested in this marriage again. I thought my husband would change when he returned home after two years. I accepted him back into my life when he appealed to me for forgiveness, but he left us again. He was always very sick whenever he came back home and I would treat him. I reported him to his parents but he didn’t change. I fasted and prayed for him but now he is paying me back with evil.
“I have aborted 15 different pregnancies for him. The last time he left home was because he asked me to abort the last two babies, which I declined. I am still in the rented apartment where he left us. My parents persuaded me to continue with him to save their face because they didn’t want me to marry two husbands.
“I am the only one caring for my children. The day he asked me to bring my children to his parents, he went behind me and angrily took them away from them without considering their future. It took the efforts of our family elders before I could see my children again. He has moved all his belongings out of the house because he has married two other wives. One of the wives has two children for him already.”
The plaintiff had stated in his petition that he was divorcing Sukurat because she was “troublesome, stubborn and wicked.”
He told the court, “She threatened to kill me and kill herself on several occasions. I left home for her because of her wickedness. She cursed my parents all the time. As she visits herbalists, she also visits pastors and Alfas. It is true I beat her when she provoked me but I treated her. She even told one of the nurses who treated her that she wanted me sacked from my office. She invited policemen to arrest me and I was locked up for two days when she knew we are not permitted to be absent from work for two days.”
The president of the court, Chief Ademola Odunade, dissolved the marriage and granted custody of the 15-year-old male child in the family to the petitioner, while the two other children were given to their mother. Odunade ordered Adewale to be paying the sum of N10,000 for the monthly upkeep of the two children in the care of the respondent.