Some people give me too much power. Apparently, we need to be careful about my articles. Because I can break families. Yawa. I can make your wife leave you? You, who is a provider. You, who looks after your wife, who respects her. You, who loves her? Wacha za ovyo, nani. But if the shoe fits, my guy, make like Cinderella and wear it.
If there is anything I do not respect, it is dead snakes. You cannot threaten me with one. Do not get me wrong, I fear reptiles, but a dead snake, no. So in the last week or so, a summary of a recently passed amendment to the succession bill has been doing the rounds on WhatsApp. At this point, I just want to mention that bilharzia (yes I know it is 2021) is wreaking havoc in Homa Bay county.
Back to our bill. Of course many a man saw it fit to send it to me because, in their small deranged worlds, this was a victory for men.
One of the points in the summary doing the rounds was that men will automatically inherit their wife's estate without first proving to court they were dependants before the death of their wives. So a man does not really have to prove dependency because many of them are dependents now before she has died.
I remember a certain man almost biting my head off somewhere because I insisted a man should not be looked after by his wife. No feminism here. If you are an African man and you are feeling entitled to your wife’s money, whether she is dead or alive, the village witch who cursed you already died. That woman’s children should inherit her money. Whether the children are yours or the community’s.
Secret lovers will have no legal rights to storm a funeral and demand to be involved. Only the legal wife and his children have the right to bury the man. This would be easier to manage if you told the man when he is still alive. Do you people know some of the things men promise women? With the help of their family and friends?
Many women find out they were the secret when the bloody fool has died. That is because the guy often dies in her house or arms or whatever. And she has children with the said fool. So she is often not demanding to be involved because she likes extreme sports, she has receipts.
Ex-wife and secret lover have no right to inherit a man's estate upon death. I wonder how many men have things to be inherited apart from NSSF benefits and embarrassments. We need to calm down, please.
Also, goat wives, before you start clapping like seals, know that all his children inherit him. So his kids plus you. I hope you know you are not always the only one who has given birth to his children. So if all he owned was your matrimonial home, it belongs to you and all his children.
A child is not proof of marriage. For anyone to be considered a wife, you must have a marriage certificate. Someone once said the most useless certificate is a marriage certificate. It only shows that you can have sex with someone without the act being called adultery or fornication, yani sin.
Listen, the child will inherit the father, so I do not know whether this was to appease a woman scorned or what. If children are being taken care of, no one wants to be married to a dead man.
This bill was supposed to protect widows. From mpangos and or slay queens. How about men putting their houses in order when they are still alive? Or also telling ourselves the truth that sometimes these men have actually started another life with another woman and the reason the courts have been granting these wives part of the inheritance is because they have proof?
Do you really want to tell me the courts for years have just been giving strange women who walk off the streets with claims money belonging to a dead man yawa? Let us be serious. People have many urgent needs that require our legislators' time and resources.
If we really want to help, let us attack the root problem. Men, leave your house in order. Write a will (if you have something to be inherited, otherwise do not waste paper)
Also, fellow women, prepare for the future. Good sense is your best friend.