One of the first Latin legal expressions a law student will learn is AUDI ALTERAM PARTEM (“hear the other side”). There are at least two sides to a story. In my line of work, clients sometimes lie. They will swear to a particular set of facts but by the time you hear from the other side, you’ll be shocked.
I watched Twinslove (Doyin and Moyin) interview conducted together with their mother. The twins told the story that their father was never part of their lives. Understandable. They are already internet sensations but the fact is that they are still young. The fact that they’ve stayed most of their lives with their mother lends credence to the fact they can only speak from the impressions given by their mother about their father.
The mother’s interview was emotion-laden. She cried her heart out. I almost cried too when I listened to her narration of an incident when the husband suggested the twins should be abandoned at an estate in Akure. It was heart-wrenching. On the whole, she painted the picture of a Devil incarnate.
I stumbled on the interview BBC Yoruba had with the father of the twins today. He was honest enough to say they had problems with their marriage but maintained stoutly he never asked the twins to be abandoned. He even produced a photograph of a birthday ceremony held for the twins after the supposed abandonment. Remember the woman claimed the man vanished after knowing that she refused to abandon the twins.
He asked a rhetorical question about the plausibility of the suggestion to abandon the children. He then went to recount at least 3 moments of abandonment of the twins by the mother who started living in Ibadan and came back at one point with a new baby, meaning she got married to or pregnant for another man. While she was away in Ibadan, the twins were the man’s mother in Ila-Orangun.
His story became more believable when he produced a document in which he recorded all instances of abandonment of the twins by the mother with dates! He seems to win the allegation battles by producing the woman’s handwriting where she wrote her account number with Wema Bank and two bank tellers evidencing payment of money into her account for the upkeep of the children. He said he stopped sending money when rather than appreciate the transfers, she was always cursing him for sending little.
Okunrin (Men), I will always advise you in case you’re separated from your wife or the mother of your child. Pay upkeeps but never neglect the task of keeping receipts of payment. They will vindicate you when an attempt is made to make your children hate you with passion.
Muideen Olagunju, a Lawyer and politician writes from Ibadan, Oyo State
