MUTINTA MULAYE writes
@SunZambian
A WOMAN of Situmbeko left the Boma Local Court devastated when her husband refused to reconcile with her.
This was a case in which Esther Kapenda, 40 took John Kalemba, 40, of the same area to court over some disputes in their marriage which she wanted the court to help them.
Kapenda told senior local court magistrate Silvia Kabunda that they got married in 1998 and lived well until 2003 when her husband stopped being an Evangelist.
“My husband started seeing another woman. He would lie to me many times that he had a problem with the car meanwhile he would be with the other woman.
“He later told me he wanted to marry her as a second wife. I refused but he insisted. He went ahead and married her and had the wedding at our home,” she said.
She said her husband’s second wife did not like going to the field but Kalemba shouted and told her to treat his new wife well instead of taking her for farming duties.
She said her husband beat her over the same issue and she even involved family elders.
“My husband moved out with his second wife to a 14 roomed house and left me and my children in a one roomed house. He doesn’t pick my calls till today and the children are suffering like they don’t have a father,” Kapenda said.
In defence, Kalemba told the court that he married a second wife because he had too many problems with Kapenda.
“My wife used to refuse to tell me about her business and would say it’s because I’m not the one who gave her capital. I never knew anything about her business.
“After I married another woman and built a house for her, my first wife started saying she would commit suicide because she didn’t like my second wife,” he said.
He said after his business collapsed, he sent his second wife to her family because the wives never got along.
He said his first wife often told him that she was giving him two years in which he was going to die.
He said he did not want to reconcile because his wife was against the idea of him having another woman and also gave all his clothes away out of frustration.
The court found that there was unreasonable behavior in the marriage by Kalemba and advised each of the parties to sue for divorce.
