Featured, Health
By Paul Ukpabio
IT may be actual stupidity in today’s world to assume that you are the biological father of each baby delivered by your wife, says Innocent Mbanga, who claims he was a recent victim of paternity fraud. According to his story, he lived with Agnes Mbanga, his wife, for seven years in Mafoluku area of Oshodi and they have two children both boys. But the marriage died a natural death when one evening, Tochukwu Ani their former neighbour, who was an apprentice tailor down their street, came visiting last year. It was there and then that neighbours all around saw the striking resemblance between Tochukwu and Innocent’s children. “It was an impeccable look alike!” muttered Innocent in vile Igbo words, shaking his head and swearing under his breath.
He said tongues began to wag immediately and the entire street busted into commotion that particular evening. Unknown to him and the entire people, Tochukwu Ani had over the years been in touch with Alice, and he was just there that evening to pick up his children.
Feeling totally and publicly humiliated and pained, at such sudden discovery, Innocent said he had to save his face and in annoyance, he threw Alice’s things outside the room they had shared over the years. A reaction, which he said, he later regretted because he was later so lonely and ashamed. He couldn’t continue to live in that place. So he left not having an immediate place to lay his head, he drifted to Oshodi under the bridge where he is sometimes spotted.
It was a betrayal of trust which brings tears to Innocent’s eyes each time he recalls the parting scene.
Like Innocent Mbanga, there was also a paternity case involving a popular Nigerian gospel singer, Tope Alabi’s daughter, Ayomikun. The story goes that her mother Tope Alabi had left her former partner Mayegun Olaoye to live and marry another man Soji Alabi and therefore changed the surname of her daughter to reflect her new marriage to her new husband.
But the biological father of her daughter, Mayegun Olaoye, suddenly appeared some months back to lay claims to the paternity of the girl, who is now a full-fledged adult. But behold the daughter said, yes, you may be my biological father, but this man is the father I know that is the man, who raised me up and who is presently living with my mother.
Innocent Mbanga and Ayomikun Alabi are not the only cases of paternity fraud. There are many, but the most controversial case of paternity fraud in recent times involved the suspended Adam Nuhu, FCMB managing director, who Moyo Thomas, a staff of the bank, allegedly had children for, despite being married to Tunde Thomas, her late husband, who died recently.
She is said to have taken an excuse from her husband Tunde to travel to the US, but on getting there with the two children, she broke the news to him that he is not the father of the two children and that they belonged to her former boss, Nuhu. Her husband had stroke, recovered and later died of depression.
But the story nauseated the public and concerned individuals, who later signed a 1000 petition calling for the sack of Nuhu: A drama that saw one father die and another father losing his exalted bank job. Again in the Moyo Thomas paternity fraud saga, the children look like Adam Nuhu more than the erstwhile father, going a long way to affirm the story.
The enormity of paternity fraud in society was revealed in a story published by a popular newspaper in Nigeria a few days after Nuhu’s suspension, which revealed that, “Three out of 10 Nigerian men are not biological fathers of their children!” This may have prompted a general clamour for DNA tests among married couples to verify the paternity of their children.
But should DNA tests be the final analysis for paternity of children in Nigeria, taking into contexts so many factors like culture and long existing tradition?
Femi Simon, who works with a laboratory where DNA tests are done explained the DNA challenge?. “What I will say is that the only way to have a definitive answer to who is the father of a child is through a DNA test. The cultural thing could bring up social issues like who is truly the father of the child, is it the person that contributed the sperm or the person, who actually raised the child. But, medically speaking as to who is the biological father of a child, it’s only DNA that can give a definite answer.”
But Femi Simon was also quick to say that it may not really be necessary for a man to go to any length to know whether he is truly the biological father of a child once he is in a marriage. According to him, the question as to whether Nigerians should accept results of DNA or abandon paternity search is a personal decision. “But then everyone has a right to know, especially since paternity fraud cases have become too rampant in our society,” he said.
Paternity tests have ruined homes which were otherwise peaceful no matter the outcome of the result and women and men’s opinion on paternity test vary.
Elizabeth Coker, an elderly secondary school teacher, insisted that the marriage ‘constitution’ is such that when you are in a marriage, any child from that marriage, belongs to the two persons that is the couple in the said marital union, irrespective of whether the child was fathered in or outside the marriage.
However, Marie Sotunde, a Strategy Consultant and Lawyer goes deep and spiritual in her response, “Seriously, when we commit to one person and then take certain vows to be their one and only spouse and partner, so be it! Notably there are some who deliberately do not take such vows and make up their own vows to suit the lifestyle they want to adopt. I expect that before the couple come together as a united front they would have discussed and agree that they should have an open relationship, acknowledging that such openness may bear fruit from different “quarters” on both sides. That is a more “civilized” way of doing things. Unfortunately, most men are carried away by the “eye candy” that is presented to them when they meet a woman. In my opinion most girls you see wandering around Lagos are “Mami wata” (Water spirit) in the real sense of the word. And if a man does not take time to study the woman he is proposing to marry very well, he should just accept anything that he sees when she becomes his wife.”
According to Gloria Doyle, another popular gospel singer, DNA simply means “Daddy needs reassurance,” but if it turns out that DNA disappoints Daddy and Daddy does not get his assurance, then too bad! He has to live with it or lose it.
Alice Ugeagha, a mother of two, said point blank that she will gladly pack out of her husband’s house if he demands for a paternity test because he would have broken the trust between us. I will not be able to look at him in the face again after he finds out the truth that they are his own children. He would have betrayed the trust I have in him.”
Asuquo Udom, an Okada rider without equivocation said: “Why should the children not be my own? She is my wife so her children must be my own.” Asked whether he would visit a laboratory to find out if the children in his house are his, Udom replied: “I will never bother about that. The children are mine from the beginning so they remain mine and ours.”
On his part, Kunle Olajimi, a banker, said that “no man will deliberately go to a laboratory to test the paternity of children that call him daddy. The only thing that will lead a man to do so is the utterances of his wife. If the wife tells him once that he may not be the father of the children, the man may then be fired by curiosity to know if it is really true.
Emmanuel Akpan supports Olajimi’s view, adding: “Men are not bothered about being the real father of the children and Nigerian men trust their married wives when it comes to the issue of children. I cannot even afford the money because I heard it costs a lot of money to do DNA test.”
Another DNA expert, who owns an office at Adeniji Jones Ikeja, but wants to remain anonymous answers the issue Emmanuel Akpan raised. According to him, a DNA test costs between N100,000 and N150,000. And at that price, he thinks that it is cheap for those who need the service.
A Clinical Psychologist, Leonard Okonkwo, says that the issue of DNA test may be seen as un-African, more so when our society does not encourage a lady to be a single mother, so when she is impregnated by a man who does not want to marry her, she considers it shameful to raise the child alone and decides to give the child to a man that she knows will accept the child. Also there are situations in some marriages where the man has the issue of infertility and because of the pressure on the woman by the man’s family, and the fact that she would not want to abort the child because she needs a baby too, she brings in a child to her husband. That way she has rest of mind from the man’s family and every other person concerned.
Okonkwo also thinks that matters regarding DNA test are rather personal decisions.
Akinyemi insists that DNA test is necessary for everyone and should be the final Analysis, “due to this digital age, besides it is not stressful and pose no risk factors, on the other hand not everyone likes culture as interesting as it can be, the method of cultural and traditional paternity might seem stressful, risk factors of lies and method involved, despite all this it’s still being appreciated.”
Even with the cases of babies switched at birth, DNA is never to be ignored, ancestral origin are now easy through DNA and records. Immigrant countries like America do not joke with DNA testing; Black Americans now are using same DNA testing to trace their Ancestral home in the Motherland (Africa).”
Knowing your DNA result is advantageous says Sam Akinyemi, it goes beyond who owns the child! “There are health benefits of knowing your biological parents or egg/sperm donors, because there are certain hereditary diseases that can run in the family carrying the DNA, so it can be properly prepared for and monitored for a healthy life.”
An opinion supported by Babajide Saheed, a Consultant, Trauma Surgeon and ex-Chairman of Lagos Medical Guild. “People should do DNA test. It is good to know. But should be done with caution! Try to open up to each other, especially to the offended before going into a test. But if there are no issues people should not do it. Anyway medically, there must be an issue before a test is considered, maybe the man has reasons to doubt the paternity of a particular child. Doctors treat history of cases we don’t just jump into treatment. That is why DNA is necessary because when we look at your history, it helps in treatment: So with DNA we know your history and the likely diseases that you can have and when.
Ade Oyediran, a pastor, nailed the issue in his response when he said: “I am a Nigerian man. DNA test is foreign to us. It is not a matter of the cost, and infidelity has always been with us for a long time, not from this generation. But it is expected culturally that when a woman gets married, she stops meeting with any other man, but concentrates on her husband because they want their own child. So it is assumed that any child in the marriage belongs to the couple. No woman will even want another man apart from the father of her child to raise her child. In our culture all children a man raises are his whether biological or not.”
– Jan. 26, 2021 @ 19:44 GMT |
Tags: Paternity fraud: Should Nigerians accept DNA as final for relationships paternity?
