By Oliko Anthony Sometimes I pity my future wife, I wonder what she will go through in
the hands of parents and sisters, will she tolerate the inevitable
intrusions? How will she manage them? What of the countless relatives
who look up to my father and to a lesser extent me? Will she be able
to keep just the right amount of people happy (you can’t please
everyone)? Western influences have made us to live in denial that
families are meant to be nuclear, but as I told a friend who was
wondering what business his uncles had in his choice of wife: “this is
Africa, just about everyone has a stake in your family, if you choose
to go it alone you will definitely suffer the consequences alone, and
trust me in these cases there are always consequences”