The Lagos State Government may have intended its latest warning on non-consensual sex within marriage to strengthen the protection of women. But by threatening husbands with punishment that could extend to life imprisonment, the state may be creating a legal framework whose consequences could be far more complicated than its proponents anticipate.
According to the Director of Public Prosecutions, Lagos State Ministry of Justice, Dr. Babajide Martins, a husband who forces his wife to have sexual intercourse after she has withheld consent could be prosecuted for sexual assault by penetration under the Lagos State Criminal Law, an offence carrying a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
The message is clear: marriage does not give a man unlimited sexual access to his wife. That principle should not be controversial. A woman is entitled to bodily autonomy, and marriage cannot be a licence for violence or brutality. But there is a larger question that policymakers must confront: “does threatening a husband with life imprisonment provide a workable response to marital conflict in a society where the consequences of breaking up a family often extend far beyond the husband and wife?” My answer is no.
The concern is not that women should be denied protection. They should not. A woman facing genuine sexual violence or sustained domestic abuse must have access to justice and effective protection. The concern is whether a heavily punitive approach, applied without adequate consideration of the peculiarities of African family life, could sometimes produce consequences that neither the woman nor the state intended.
Marriage in Nigeria is rarely an arrangement involving only two individuals. Children, extended family members, dependents and economic obligations are usually involved. In many households, husband and wife jointly provide the resources required to keep the family functioning. So, what happens when a woman reports her husband, he is prosecuted and eventually sentenced to a lengthy term of imprisonment? Who pays the children’s school fees? Who pays the rent? Who provides food and healthcare? Who takes responsibility for the numerous obligations that the husband may ordinarily shoulder?
The criminal justice system can remove a man from his home. It cannot automatically replace his income, parental responsibilities or contribution to the family. That is where the apparent simplicity of the policy encounters the complicated reality of family life.
At this juncture, it is also germane to ask, would every woman want this outcome? There is another uncomfortable question that policymakers should be prepared to answer. For a woman determined to escape an abusive marriage, prosecution may be exactly what she needs. Such women must have the right to seek justice without intimidation or pressure to remain in dangerous relationships. But what about the woman who does not want her marriage to end? What about the woman who wants her husband to stop unacceptable behaviour, undergo counselling, change his conduct and remain a father to their children? Would she necessarily want to initiate a criminal process that could ultimately result in her husband’s imprisonment for life? That is the dilemma policymakers cannot simply legislate away.
A woman may want her husband’s behaviour stopped without wanting her children’s father permanently removed from their lives. She may want intervention, counselling, structured separation or reconciliation under safer conditions rather than the complete collapse of her household. This is why it would be dangerous to assume that every woman who complains about her husband’s sexual conduct is seeking to terminate her marriage through criminal prosecution. The law must recognize that victims have different circumstances, different economic realities and different expectations of what justice should achieve.
Again, the law in this context should be cognizant of the fact that the children are not on trial. The children are another important part of this conversation. They do not choose their parents’ conflicts, yet they can become the greatest casualties when marital disagreements lead to imprisonment, separation or divorce. A father sentenced to a lengthy prison term is not merely an offender removed from society. He is also a parent removed from the everyday lives of his children.
Again, this is not an argument for allowing sexual abuse to go unpunished. It is an argument for ensuring that punishment is accompanied by mechanisms that protect innocent dependents from its collateral consequences. So, if a man is imprisoned, who ensures that his children remain in school? Who provides for their basic needs? Who offers psychological support where necessary?
A justice system that protects one member of a family but leaves innocent dependents exposed to severe economic and emotional hardship must be prepared to confront those consequences.
Also to be taken cognizant of is that the African family is different. There is also a danger in approaching African family life exclusively through legal models developed in societies with very different social and economic structures. In fact, African communities have traditionally relied, sometimes imperfectly, on elders, relatives, religious leaders and community structures to intervene in domestic disputes. Those traditional mechanisms were certainly not flawless. In some cases, they failed women terribly by pressuring victims to remain in abusive relationships or by treating domestic violence as a private family matter.
In as much as that failure must never be romanticized, abandoning every possibility of mediation, counselling and reconciliation because some traditional interventions were abused would be equally misguided. So, there should be a firm place for criminal prosecution where there is serious violence, repeated abuse, coercion or conduct that places a spouse in genuine danger. At the same time, there should be room for counselling, psychological intervention, structured separation, rehabilitation and carefully supervised mediation where circumstances permit. The objective should not simply be to punish a husband.
It should be to protect the woman, protect the children, stop the abusive behaviour and prevent its recurrence.
Against the backdrop of the law, there is no denying the fact that when protection becomes another burden it is sticky. The irony is difficult to ignore. The state says it wants to protect women. But if the practical consequence of intervention is to leave a woman solely responsible for children, household expenses and other family obligations after her husband’s imprisonment, policymakers must ask whether they have considered the entire chain of consequences.
There is a fundamental difference between empowering a woman to escape violence and leaving her to bear the economic consequences of a criminal process that could permanently remove her husband from the household and potentially end the marriage, particularly if he chooses not to continue the relationship after serving his prison term.
In Nigeria, where many families already struggle with rising costs of food, housing, education and healthcare, that distinction matters. Some women may absolutely want their husbands prosecuted. They should have that option where a crime has been committed.
But policymakers must equally recognize that other women may want the behavior stopped without wanting their families destroyed. The state should therefore avoid creating a situation in which a woman feels that her only choices are to endure unacceptable conduct or trigger a criminal process carrying potentially devastating consequences.
In fact, justice must be more than a hammer. This is as the state has a legitimate responsibility to protect women from sexual violence. It must prosecute genuine criminal conduct and make it clear that marriage is not a licence for brutality. But justice should not become a hammer with which every complicated marital problem is reduced to criminal proceedings. The Lagos DPP’s warning should therefore provoke a wider conversation about what happens after prosecution. If the maximum punishment is life imprisonment, where is the corresponding framework for family counselling, rehabilitation, child support and economic protection? Where is the mechanism for helping a woman who wants her husband corrected rather than imprisoned? Where is the support system for children whose father has been removed from the household? And where is the recognition that a woman can demand respect for her consent without necessarily wanting the complete destruction of her marriage? These questions do not diminish the seriousness of sexual violence. They make the debate more responsible.
In fact, the answer to marital abuse cannot be silence. Women must never be compelled to tolerate sexual violence simply because they are married. But neither should the state pretend that imprisonment, particularly a sentence as severe as life imprisonment, has no consequences beyond the offender.
In an African society where marriage remains deeply intertwined with child-rearing, economic survival and extended-family responsibilities, lawmakers must look beyond the courtroom and consider what happens to the family after the prison gates close.
In fact, the ultimate test of justice should not simply be how many offenders are sent to prison. It should be whether, after justice has been served, the victim is safer, the children are protected, the abusive behaviour has been addressed and society is stronger. If a law fails to account for those consequences, then it deserves serious reconsideration, not because women deserve less protection, but because effective justice must protect victims without being blind to the innocent people who may be caught in its aftermath.
