Yesterday, news made rounds that a 19-year-old secondary school leaver, Confidence Nwanma was stabbed to death by her 24-year-old boyfriend, Saliu Ladayo after she reportedly cursed him after he was seen with another woman.
Shortly after the killer boyfriend was arrested by police officers attached to the Ondo State Police Command, the father of the deceased Mr. Jude Nwanma, who spoke to Punch’s correspondent at his residence at Oke Aro, Akure, said that the custom must be observed in their home town in the Oru East Local Government Area of Imo State before his late daughter was buried.
According to him, failure to perform the traditional rite would cause calamity to befall the family of Ladayo.
Mr. Nwanma said:
“In our place, it is mandatory that the man must marry the corpse of our daughter. We must observe the custom by taking the corpse to our village where the marriage would take place.
“It is mandatory that he pays the dowry in double because he brought our daughter dead for marriage.
“He would observe all the dictates of the custom before our family would let him go. Without this, every young person from the family of the man will never get to the age of our daughter. They will die a sudden death just like our daughter.
” This is not our making; it is the way our ancestors put it down even before we were born. Our people all over the world are waiting for the court judgment. Whichever way it goes, the boy must perform the marital rite to our daughter’s corpse”
