Edo State First Lady, Mrs. Betsy Obaseki, is reputed for her calm disposition. But her gentle mien was provoked into anger at the government-owned Edo Specialist Hospital in Benin, the state capital.

Mrs. Obaseki was addressing 32-year-old Mrs. Tina Okhiria, a mother of two children and wife of a forty-year-old businessman, Joanki Okhiria, an indigene of Iruekpen, Esan West Local Government Area, Edo State, accused of shooting his wife in the left arm because she did not prepare his meal on time, causing same to be amputated.

Joanki gunshot had disfigured the looks of the beautiful but defenceless young woman, following which her elderly mother expressed disappointment with the “shameful conduct” of his son-in-law, who has since been arrested and charged to court by the Edo State Police Command for attempted murder.

Condemning Joanki’s “barbaric act”, the public relations officer of Edo State Police Command, Chidi Nwabuzor, a Superintendent of Police (SP), declared that the cerebral officers of the command’s legal unit would ensure diligent prosecution of the accused husband and he would be made to bear the full weight of the law to serve as deterrent for other abusive ones.

Joanki, who was said to be drunk, had reportedly opened a bottle of cold beverage he fetched from the refrigerator and emptied its content on his wife of seven years before shooting her at close range with a double-barrel gun.

Tina’s aged mother said: “Her husband, many times, moved out her belongings, forcing her to move to the house of her elder sister.

“But he would later come to beg and pick up the items, and my daughter would return to his house, preferring to remain in the abusive marriage, claiming that it was for the sake of her children.”

Tina’s mother also stated that given the way her son-in-law was regularly coming to beg for forgiveness, she assumed that the young man would change for better, but, unfortunately, he failed to make amends.

Tina, speaking amid pains from her hospital bed, said: “My husband returned home drunk and lay on the floor of our living room. I politely asked him to move into the bedroom.

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“But before he reluctantly agreed to go into the bedroom, he told me to warm some rice for him so he could eat.

“I went into the kitchen, warmed the rice and took the requested food to him, but he was already asleep. I then covered the food and put it on the table.

“I felt that by the time he woke up, he might ask for a different food. Hence I took his Automated Teller Machine (ATM) card and withdrew N7,500 from his account.

“I gave the money to the wife of our security guard to help me buy some items so I could prepare a special meal for my husband.

“As I was preparing the food, my husband woke up and I heard him asking my son of my whereabouts.

“My son told him that I was in the kitchen, and he started screaming that I was always preparing rice for him, forgetting that he was the one that had earlier asked me to warm rice for him, but I later used my discretion to prepare another meal for him.

“My husband then came out of the room and rushed to meet me in the kitchen, and I gently explained that I was cooking something different from the rice he had requested.

“Surprisingly, he pushed me aside, rushed towards the refrigerator and collected a bottle of coke. He opened it and emptied the content on my head.

“I rushed to meet his bosom friend in the neighbourhood and told him what his friend had done to me.

“His friend asked me to calm down while my husband continued to scream. He held my throat and was trying to strangle me.

“His friend told him to stop in order not to kill me and he left me.

“But as I made to go inside our apartment, he blocked me.

“His friend closed our apartment’s front door but my husband went through the back door, and before I knew what was happening, I saw him with a gun. He shot me in my left arm at close range and I passed out. I did not know how I got to the hospital.”

Tina said her husband was in the habit of abusing, ridiculing, insulting and battering her.

In her reaction to the incident, Mrs. Obaseki said: “Many women who ought to be happily married are suffering in their marriages because of their children, and they will refuse to speak up, l while they are suffering and dying in silence.

“Most women who remain in their marriages because of their children get married to irresponsible and wicked men.

“Do not wait until you are killed. Report cases of abuse to the Edo State Ministry of Social Development and Gender Issues.

“You do not remain in a situation where somebody is abusing you. He did not create you, so he has no right to abuse you, his feeding you and your children notwithstanding.

“As soon as you see it happening, you must report him to the ministry (of Social Development and Gender Issues) and the law-enforcement agents, and they will come and stop it in order to save your life and the lives of your children.

“Most wives prefer to stay in abusive marriages without reporting the animalistic behaviour of their husbands to the authorities, because they are afraid.

“Do not forget that bad things can happen to you in an abusive marriage. Abusive wives must always speak up.

“What can the abusive husbands do? When their wives report them, the officials will come and correct them.

“In cases where they observe that their husbands cannot change for the better, before the wives are killed, they would be taken away and some things would be arranged for them, because their lives are more important.

“Marriage is meant for happiness. If you are not getting happiness as a wife, you have no business remaining in the abusive marriage.

“Marriage is not a prison sentence. Why would you stay in an abusive marriage and continue to take rubbish? Why would you allow an ordinary human being to abuse you and you keep quiet? Who born am (him)?

“The crime is not just against the victim; it is against the government. Even if your husband begs tomorrow, just ignore him. Government will jail him, because that is the law. So that others will learn lessons.

“This kind of madness that is going on in Edo State and other parts of Nigeria, if you try it again, you will end up in jail.

“So, it will stop, and wives will stop suffering this kind of nonsense at the hands of mad men that they call husbands.”

In a gesture of support, the Edo First Lady assured Tina of being assisted to obtain myoelectric arm to alleviate the loss she suffered.

The shooting incident had taken place on June 2, 2023 at the the couple’s home in Ekae Government Reservation Area (GRA), Sapele Road, Benin, while Joanki was arrested by policemen from the Edo State Command on June 3 and arraigned on June 15, after which he was remanded in prison custody. (The Nation)

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