Love and Emotions: Why Parents should stop Spouse Selection for Children

By Adebayo Joshua

Love they say is a beautiful thing especially when duos are perfect and emotionally attached.

Considering the size of a country like Nigeria with over a hundred and fifty ethic groups, and different languages, many meets through several means such as inside a vehicle, on the road, in another state, schools, jobs, worship places etc., get entangled in relationship which most often results in marriage.

Infact the conceptual idea of NYSC is to promote unity, which severally has been achieved through Marriage etc.

Some of the opinion that ethnicity, culture and interstate differences shouldn’t debar or be a stumbling block to relationship between two partners from different states and background other believes sees the coming together of different state and ethnics should be as an impossibility holding to the foundation in time past which has been built on enmity.

In our society, when you marry a person from another community, it’s common for other people to identify him/her on the basis of that community “She married an ekiti man “He married an efik woman”, forget the place of ‘Love and Emotion’

This however most time gets in the way of having a successful relationship and marriage.

In Nigeria today cases of ethnic diversity in relationship has recorded high increase in homes.

Parents are equally not helping matters as they want to be in the gap of dictating the state where their child will picks spouse from. Of course one will argue that the parents are the guardians but we should be aware that a child becomes an adult and his responsible for his/her actions and inactions from the age of 18.

For me, it is not appropriate for Parents to dictate States and Religion where their Children will make their Marital Choices.

Although most often, this action is often carried done out of Ignorance, illiteracy or mixed feelings or self interest on the part of parents which is immediate; the suffering of the repercussion of such act is however for a lifetime for the children.

At first the couples may be forced to answer to their parents wish and live together but gradually like the law of the ‘Diminishing Returns’ they begin to lose the value of each other. Hatred begins to set in, then fight becomes the other of the day in the home.

The irony however is that the parents at the point will no longer be in the picture as they will definitely will be living apart.

Presently the situation of Nigeria doesn’t call for a promotion of religion, language coupled with the ethics which bring me to the point of call that as a Nation we to cherish our diversity culture and ethnicity by not discriminating.

We need to realize that culture and ethnics are dynamic, allowing for continuous change  while recognizing  that modern relationships are run on shared “Amorphous “entity called society.

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WRITER: Adebayo Joshua is a motivational writer and currently the

Kwara State Correspondent for Campus Focus.

For Feedback please send a mail to: ajoshua@campusfocus.com.ng