HUSBANDS AS KINGS

Te Aroha News, Volume XLI, Issue 6544, 15 November 1924, Page 3

HUSBANDS AS KINGS

THE QUEER LAWS OF THE YORUBA PEOPLE There* are folks everywhere who make life a misery; headmen who lord.it over their fellows. You find them in church and in council chamber. When they walk the roads little children clamber over the hedges to escape their wrath, and grown people feign delight in their talk and take a jpy in cursing them when they have passed by. The bad headman is the problem of humanity, and as old. And when the problem has been solved, the gentle man and the timid woman will realise a little of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. The simple people of Yoruba, »in Nigeria, have got over the problem in a grand way. Acrording to A. K. Ajisafe (who is one of them) they have a custom called “kirikiri” to deal with the nuisance.. Mr Ajisafe explains it in “The Laws and Customs of the Yoruba People.” • It is very simple. When a king, or chief or some powerful man has made himself unpopular by his tyrannical actions, a mob gathers outside his house singing insolent songs and abasing him and throwing sand and stones into his quarters. ' JUDGE AND PROTECTOR’ \ All this is to show that, he is no longer wanted. These demonstrations may take, place every night for three months. Then, -if he does not show a change of heart or comiriit suicide, he is just killed, ‘ A Yoruba man can marry as many wives as he likes, but all the families must live together, and he is respected and obeyed as though he were , a king. V He may punish at his discretion — flog, chain, whip, demand Marriages, fine, put in the stock or imprison. But he is also bound to protect the mem'bers of his family agaipst ill* or unfair treatment. However. muqh he niay dislike his children he must bequeath them his property. When a girl is about to,, marry,' th£ bridegroom pays ,a dowry to her parents. The amount of the dowry vary ies. If the girl’s parents are well-to-do, the sum may he as low as fifty shulings, but if they v are poor, it may reach fifteen pounds. The rule is that whatever one is capable of giving, that he gives, for dowry. According to the criminal code, no woman must whistler. Tfie’ woman who does so is regarded as a witch, and the law is: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” The woman who plies ft canoe is punished with death. PUNISHING THE DOCTpR . The Yorubas Jiave a drastic way of dealing with doctors. ' Should a patient die, says Mr Ajisafe,, and there is reason to believe thaft death was caused by the doctor administering strong medicine or poiscfcy the doctor is - asked to die fiy, the side of the patient. , / The king’s visitors do not bother about court dress, long as they do not wear socks or carry an umbrella, past the king’s house. ' If they do, they may be heavily fined, or imprisoned, or executed.