A man, Olalekan Olapade, has prayed Oja Oba/Mapo Court C Customary Court, Mapo, Ibadan, Oyo State, to end his marriage to his wife, Barakat Olapade.
Olalekan in his divorce suit alleged that his wife was troublesome, destructive and in the habit of going through his phone.
According to him, he has had enough of her atrocities and therefore appealed to the court to rule that they go their different ways. The plaintiff further pleaded with the court to grant him custody of the only child in their marriage.
Barakat admitted to claim but refused that her husband had custody of their child who is one year old.
“My lord, I pray this court to set me free from this bondage I walked into blindly called marriage. I’ve learnt in a hard way that love is not blind; anyone planning to go into marriage must choose his or her partner with the eyes wide open, “Olalekan stated.
He went on, “I was head over heels in love with my wife when we met and never took pain to study her well enough. Today, I don’t have to be told we are not compatible.
“I’ve never met someone as troublesome as my wife. She turned our home upside down because she never ceased to fight me. She wearied me with her constant fight.
“She’s easily provoked and difficult to placate because she will never listen to anyone. When she’s angry, her eyes will turn red and she would destroy everything in the house. I have spent a fortune replacing things she destroyed and this gradually became our pattern of living. She destroyed my Plasma television, musical gadgets and other valuables.
“My lord, one of the things which regularly caused misunderstanding between us was her habit of going through my phone. She was always suspecting that I was having affairs with other women and would therefore go through my call logs and SMS in order to confirm this.
“I was never at peace for the few years we lived together. Any time we had a quarrel, she would threaten to deal with me or get rid of me. I eventually had my peace when she moved out of my house of her own free will.
“Since she left, I have made it a duty to constantly provide for the needs of our child she took along with her.
“My lord, my day will be made if my prayer of divorce is granted, “Olalekan said.
“My husband is not a straightforward person, “Barakat told the court. “He’s a pathological liar and did hide many things about himself from me.
“He’s also stubborn and believes that as a woman I can’t advise or counsel him. Anytime we needed to take a decision concerning the home, he would be rigid and block his ears from whatever contribution I had to make. He would go ahead and carry out his wish which would certainly fail. Any time this happened he would lay the blame on me and beat me mercilessly.
“There were times he destroyed my belongings. He destroyed my phones on three different occasions and refused to replace them, ”she added.
“My lord, he has no shame. He borrowed money from my mum and has not deemed it fit to pay back till date.
“He later abandoned me and our kid and failed to take care of us. I moved out of his house with our child since he was not bothered if we were living or not, “the defendant concluded.
Ruling after he had listened to both parties, the court president, Chief Ademola Odunade dissolved their marriage and gave custody of their child to the defendant.
The plaintiff was instructed to take up responsibility of their child’s welfare, feeding, schooling and health care in particular.
He was asked to give the defendant N4, 000 through the court monthly as their child’s feeding allowance.