POLYGAMOUS marriages go with challenges that if not well-handled, would haunt all parties involved into misery.
Polygamy, described as a marriage where a man takes two or more wives based on either tribal or religious beliefs.
Few parties that have entered in such marriages have come out to declare happiness and harmony.
In Lusaka’s Kanyama Township resides a man who has opted to share a single bed with his two wives.
The man rents a roomed house and claimed he could not afford to buy another bed and that it was because he loved his women so he could share a bed with them.
Revelations that one of his wives has reported him to human rights activists for forcing her and another woman to share a bed confirms all is not well.
Grace Tembo of Kanyama Township said she could no longer share her husband, Gift Sitali who slept in between her and another woman, Grace Pumulo.
According to a statement obtained by the Sunday Times during the week, Sitali married Tembo in 2009 after impregnating her, but brought in Pumulo while on separation with the former.
CK Equity and Human Rights programme coordinator Cosmas Kangondo is right that the institution was shocked to learn that a man could sleep with two wives on the same bed.
Surprising indeed, that the man made it clear he saw nothing wrong for him to sleep with two women on the same bed because he claimed to love both.
We wonder what love has got to do with a union that only breeds hurt and trauma of the ones he claims to love.
What has love got to do with a man who does not respect nor feel for those he says he loves, forcing them to ‘sandwich’ him whole night long.
His failure to acquire an extra bed or rent a more spacious house suggests he is not worthy of two women.