Indigenous Marriage Institutions and Divorce in Nigeria: the Case of Abia State of Nigeria

Discouraging socio cultural factors and/ or conditions that influence divorce and/or separation have long been matters of concern to spouses in Africa especially in Nigeria where divorce affects the overall development of women. For instance, a divorced woman suffers discrimination because she is neither accepted in her matrimonial nor maternal home. However, some actions against divorced women are done in other to humiliate them for bringing shame and dishonour to their maternal families (1). In Igbo tradition, men who have large acres of farmland are encouraged to engage in multiple marriages so as to have women who would work in the farms. Women who are lazy to do farm work or not so fertile as to have large number of children who would also work in the farm were divorced. This means that hadrd work and high fertility were the basis for successful marriages. Today, with INDIGENOUS MARRIAGE INSTITUTIONS AND DIVORCE IN NIGERIA: THE CASE OF ABIA STATE OF NIGERIA