"Alcohol helped me see through my wife", reveals man to a Nyeri court

By Nderitu Gichure

NYERI, KENYA: A Nyeri court has allowed a separation for man who claimed that stopping alcoholism helped him see through his wife.

Chief magistrate Wilbroda Juma agreed to dissolve the marriage saying both parties were sitting on the fence and doing little to salvage their union.

Juma blamed Nicholas Mugendi Muchira( the applicant ) and Agnes Wanjiku( the respondent) for doing little to salvage their seven year marriage.

Muchira had filed a divorce suit seeking to end his union with Wanjiku entered into under the Embu customary law in 2002.

Muchira had accused Wanjiku of allegedly deserting her matrimonial home in 2009.

He told the court he used to abuse alcohol prior 2005 but shortly after abandoning the habit he saw through the negative character of his wife.

“I found she was prone to quarreling and used abusive language and lacked respect for me,” he said.

He further told the court that Wanjiku grossly neglected her marital duties and also accused her of failing to perform her conjugal duty adding that “she verbally and physically assaulted him."

Wanjiku denied all the allegations leveled against her and instead accused her former husband of infidelity.

She termed him as an immoral man, violent and selfish in nature a saying he physically and verbally abused her.

Wanjiku further accused Machira of driving her away from their matrimonial home at night and denying her conjugal rights.

She said he had failed to provide food for the couple’s two children aged between 12 and nine years.

She told the court that the man of the house usually turned violent when asked for food and other house expenses.

“ I left him with the children but I later applied to have their custody,' she added.

She also told the court that she was not willing to reconcile as they broke up in 2009 and each lived their separate lives.

However, she agreed to have used abusive language to her husband saying it was a “tit for tat,” affair.

“The marriage has broken down and cannot be redeemed,” said the magistrate “The court cannot force the two into a marriage.”

She noted the couple was unwilling to give the marriage a second chance and had failed to show that they had contacted their parents to resolve their differences.

The court however rejected the respondent’s application to have the former husband compelled to pay a maintenance cost of Sh 20,000 per month and the cost of the suit.