Such is the dilemma being faced by a 50-year-old woman from
Ntabazinduna, Matabeleland North province who sued her 54-year-old husband for
neglecting his “marital duties” by refusing to have sex with her.
Peggy Nkomo from Mabutweni Line, claimed her husband of
more than three decades, Morgan Mhlanga, has not initiated sex once in at least
six years. The couple is sleeping in separate bedrooms.
In her application for a protection order at the Bulawayo
Civil Court, she claimed her husband was not only abusive, but was also at
fault for “incapacity to meet his duties as the father of the house”.
She, however, caused a raucous in court when she passionately
begged the presiding magistrate Nkosinomusa Ncube to “force” her husband to
come back to their matrimonial bedroom, a plea she made while indicating that
she had stayed for so long without her husband’s intimacy.
“Morgan Mhlanga is my husband. He has been abusive since we
started staying together until the time he moved out of our matrimonial bedroom
and that was six years ago. He has been hitting me whenever he feels like he
wants to beat me. He is now staying in a separate bedroom and does not talk to
me anymore despite the fact that we are staying in the same house. He also does
not allow me to use some of the matrimonial property and is now cooking on his
own,” complained Nkomo.
She said her husband was also harassing their children and
grandchildren.
In response Mhlanga defended his actions of slapping his
wife with sex sanctions saying she was “talkative”.
“I moved out of the bedroom to avoid confrontation because
she talks a lot. It’s not true that I am harassing her and the children. I’m so
close to my children and grandchildren to an extent that they even call me
bhudas (brother). I am surprised why she is saying I’m abusing her since it’s
almost six years without talking to her,” responded Mhlanga.
His response impelled the magistrate to ask Nkomo: “Why are
you saying the respondent (her husband) is harassing you when he doesn’t talk
to you? What do you mean?
“It’s true that we are not on talking terms since 2016
because when he moved out of the matrimonial bedroom, he took all the blankets.
My request now is that I want him back to the bedroom because I don’t have a
man. Where am I going to get another husband? What pains me is that when he
married me, I was 19 years old and he is now refusing to sleep with me despite
the fact that I still need a man,” Nkomo passionately pleaded while throwing
her hands in the air.
“But I can’t force him to sleep with you. I really can’t.
That is not the purpose of this court. The purpose of this court is to protect
you whenever I’m satisfied that there are repeated incidents of domestic
violence that put your life in danger,” responded the magistrate.
In her ruling the magistrate dismissed Nkomo’s application
for lack of merit. B Metro
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