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Nairobi Journal: Is Polygamy Confusing, or Just a Matter of Family
Values?
December 16, 2003 By MARC LACEY NAIROBI, Kenya, Dec. 15 - When President Mwai Kibaki of Kenya arrived at the White House recently for a state visit, his wife, Lucy Kibaki, was at his side, resplendent in a flowing gown. Perhaps fortunately for the White House protocol office, which has little experience with polygamous relationships, Mr. Kibaki left his second wife, Wambui Kibaki, back home. Mr. Kibaki's multiple marriage has been known for decades among close friends and family in his native village of Othaya, near Mount Kenya. But most Kenyan voters first learned of it on Sunday morning, nearly a year into Mr. Kibaki's presidency, when a local newspaper, The East African Standard, splashed a profile of Mr. Kibaki's second wife on its front page. Such a complicated family life is not uncommon here. By no means limited to Muslims, polygamy is widely practiced in Africa, particularly among the well-off members of Mr. Kibaki's generation who can afford multiple dowries and the expense of keeping more than one home. But polygamy is also falling from favor, according to social scientists and women's rights advocates, especially among younger Kenyans, and Mr. Kibaki has not sought to publicize his living arrangements. His official campaign Web site, for example, mentioned only one Mrs. Kibaki. "I don't believe in sharing husbands," said Rose Nganga, 20, a Nairobi college student. "If my husband were to bring another wife, he would have to either divorce her or me. Why should I be the second wheel to a man?" For polygamy to work peacefully, the wives must buy into the tradition. Sometimes an older wife will actually assist her husband in choosing a younger bride, typically to provide some assistance with all the work at the homestead. But Kenya's newspapers are rife with stories of disputes between wives of the same husband. They frequently scheme against each other and sometimes come to blows. Andrew, 26, a Nairobi bartender who declined to give his last name, grew up in such a situation. His father took his mother's sister as a second wife when he was about 7. "I remember being confused on whether I should call her aunt or stepmother," he said in an interview. "It became too much for my mother, and we left. I was not in a polygamous family for that long, but it was long enough to understand that it breaks home and hearts." Mr. Kibaki's home life is, by all accounts, a calm one. Lucy Kibaki, a former schoolteacher whom Mr. Kibaki married in the 1960's, lives with the president. Wambui Kibaki, who was also a schoolteacher before meeting Mr. Kibaki in the 1970's, occupies the presidential ranch. It is Lucy Kibaki who typically appears at Mr. Kibaki's side at ceremonial functions and acts as first lady. But Wambui Kibaki is often just a few rows behind the first couple, as she was last Friday at a 40th anniversary celebration of Kenya's independence from Britain. Wambui Kibaki has her own security detail and more access to the presidential office compound than many ministers. Parliament is debating whether the government ought to provide benefits should a retired president have more than one spouse. In the only interview she has given since her husband took over the presidency a year ago, Wambui Kibaki said she was comfortable with her arrangement. "I do not feel restricted," she told The Standard. "I have my time with him, just as before he became president. I go to State House when I want, and I can't complain. I am his wife, and not being made public does not bother me." Mr. Kibaki is not the first polygamous politician here. Kenya's first president, Jomo Kenyatta, had several wives, although only one of them took on the official role of first lady. A recently retired member of Parliament, Dickson Kihaika Kimani, has more than a dozen wives. Last fall he sought to have two of them join him in Parliament, but voters rejected their candidacies - and his as well. Supporters of the practice say that in the AIDS era, polygamy is a far healthier arrangement than another one favored by many men: one wife and one or more mistresses, or even prostitutes. On the same day that The Standard was detailing Mr. Kibaki's home life, Nairobi's other major newspaper, The Daily Nation, broke the story of a major prostitution sting that rounded up more than 100 young girls, many of them university students. Among those caught up in the police roundup were three top Kenyan politicians, all of them married men and all videotaped with seminude prostitutes in their vehicles. But polygamous relationships, too, are blamed for helping spread AIDS. The more sexual partners involved, critics say, even under the cloak of marriage, the greater risk of the disease spreading, particularly as some men take on multiple wives and still have affairs on the side. In an advertising campaign aimed at reducing the spread of AIDS, Mr. Kibaki urges Kenyans to "be faithful." He avoids the ticklish question of how much faithfulness he thinks that Kenyan men ought to spread around. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/16/international/africa/16NAIR.html --------------------------------- For general information about NYTimes.com, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]. Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company |
