By Maria Famakinwa
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All over the world, especially in Africa, children are expected to care for their aged parents who passed through thick and thin to train them. We believe in this part of the world that no love shown to one’s parents at old age can measure up the challenges they went through for their children to be successful in life. As a way of appreciation, children are expected to do everything within their reach to replicate such parental unconditional love, especially at their old age. Since both fathers and mothers struggle to nurture their children, it is worrisome that most children prefer to care for their mothers at old age while the fathers are abandoned.
Recent findings have shown that about 75 percent of fathers in Africa, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, suffer abandonment from their wives and children whom they hope to depend on in old age. Some social experts have disclosed that behavioural factors causing fathers’ abandonment and sheer suffering in their old age are rooted in African culture itself. For example, one of these behavioural factors include a high preference for African mothers in the society.
In the words of a trader, Mr Temitope Arikawe, most men who are abandoned by their children at old age must have offended the mothers of their children while those children were growing up. He said: “Men who maltreat their wives should know that the children are watching. Men who beat their wives should understand that the children are waiting for their pay back time.
“There is what we call family politics where the father and the mother try to win the children’s love. If as a father you cannot win your children’s love, please try to love your wife the more. Once a man is able to win the wife’s love, he has indirectly won the children’s love because the wife will always speak good on his behalf to the children. This was the theory I learnt early in life from my dad. My mother made us to love my father even though we saw my father as a tough man.
“You should understand that African culture places high preference on mothers. That is why mothers are cherished and called “Wura Iyebiye” in the south-western part of Nigeria where I came from, meaning “valuable gold,” while fathers on the other hand are called “dingi” meaning “breakable mirror” Fathers should be careful of how they treat their wives because children are watching and taking notes till the day of reckoning. This, to me, is the major reason some men suffer abandonment at old age.”
Sharing a similar view, a 73-year-old retired teacher, Mrs Yetunde Ogundimu, explained that men who abandon their wives and children for another women may suffer rejection at old age because it is not possible to reap where one did not sow.
The grandmother who cited an example of a man abandoned by his children said: “The man in particular was a family friend who was financially blessed. He was doing well and performing his role as the family head before he met a strange woman who destroyed his family. He left his wife with five children and came home once in five months, until he decided to forget his wife and children and settle for the woman who already had four children for two men. His wife, a teacher, was able to cater for the children from her monthly salary and the assistance from her family.
“Though the father came back to his wife after the strange woman defrauded him, it was too late. His children who are now married and doing well don’t like to associate with their 74-year-old father who is down with stroke, as they remind him how he abandoned them and their mother while they were growing up. Most men are the causes of their old age loneliness.”
Another reason why fathers are more prone to neglect at old age, according to an engineer, Mr Fatai Alonge, is the factor of who goes to take care of the newly born grand baby.
Known as “omugo” in Igbo, findings showed that mothers are culturally privileged to travel down to take care of their newly born grandchildren, leaving the father to languish in hunger and in complete loneliness.
“That cultural practice must be amended or stopped. I have two girls and a boy, and I have been sounding a note of warning to them that if they get married and have their babies, they should be expecting me and my wife, otherwise they should bring the baby to our house. How can fathers with higher responsibilities such as payment of house rents, children’s upkeep, school fees from the basics to higher institutions and hospital bills among others be left to suffer neglect at old age due to a cultural practice that allows only the mother to care for newborns? Who says fathers cannot do the same? As we speak, some mothers have traveled abroad for years under the pretence of catering for their grandchildren, while their husbands are left in the country languishing in loneliness. I am not in support of such discriminatory culture and my wife cannot go for baby nursing without me.”
The engineer further appealed to mothers to desist from reporting their husbands to their children or painting their husbands bad in the presence of their children, as he added that such also contribute to men’s abandonment at old age. He said: “From findings, mothers usually out- play fathers in the game of wooing the favour of the children. As mothers take the advantages of fathers’ high handedness and bullying tendencies in training the children, mothers most times appear sympathetic in placating the children with emotion. Since they have the children on their side, whatever they tell them goes a long way to affect their relationship with their fathers,” he said.
A graduate, Mr Inioluwa Kayode, said that men may suffer abandonment at old age due to the fact that most countries in Africa, especially Nigeria, lack needed facilities to cater for the aged which he observed prompted most African parents to place more emphasis on the child’s welfare, education, development and empowerment, so that they can reciprocate their kind gesture at old age.
The man who advised fathers to build cordial relationship with their children so as not to be abandoned at old age said: “African fathers should drop the mentality of bullying their children in the name of discipline. Some fathers go as far as tying children to trees while flogging them. Recently, a man was reported to have starved his three children for three months for stealing during which two of them died.
This was too extreme. No surviving child would overlook such wickedness and take care of such a cruel father at old age. Fathers should stop being wicked to their children. A father’s role in the family goes beyond being the protector, provider and disciplinarian. They should also be accessible, approachable and compassionate to their children. They should build solid relationships with their children and let them know that they are responsible as a father and they should forever protect them to achieve their future destinies. Fathers should show love to their children, let them know that their fathers genuinely love them. Always say: “I love you” as this will have a major impact in sustaining long ties between the fathers and their children. Fathers who can win their children’s love while growing up cannot be abandoned at old age,” he said.
