HIGH COST OF DOWRY IN BONABOTO, BAWKU AREAS FINDS SOLUTION

Naba Bosongo-Dogumpoeya (L) and Puanab Alasbuudi (R)

About three decades ago, payment of dowry or performance of customary marriage rites of a young woman in the BONABOTO and Bawku Traditional Areas in the Upper East Region of Ghana, was not a problem at all to any prospective married man. 

Cows, which are mainly required in terms of resources for the payment of the dowry of a woman to her family, were in abundance and readily available for men to use to perform such rites. Indeed, oral history has it that, in the past it was acceptable for a man to pay the dowry of another man who has not got the four cows as required by tradition.

But currently, the lack or high cost of cows is making it extremely impossible for women and men, seemingly burning with the passion of love to get married. Besides, the problem is also discouraging men from other tribes and traditional jurisdictions, who finally express interest in marrying young women in the area. For instance, one marriage-cow is equivalent to seven sheep and in monetary terms, cost between GH¢300.00 and GH¢400.00.  

In an interview with the Paramount Queen Mother of the Bawku Traditional Area, Puanab Alasbuudi and a Senior Divisional Chief of Nyariga Traditional Area, Naba Bosongo-Dogumpoeya, they told Savannahnews that the high cost of dowry was denying many young men and women the opportunity to get married, and further escalating the population of single parents and causing broken homes in both areas which was a bad omen to their family systems.

Both Traditional Authorities also confirmed that the problem was increasingly leading to reckless sexual lifestyles, thus making victims involved brought forth bastards, engaged in unsafe abortion practices, and faced the risk of acquiring sexually transmitted infections among others.  

Speaking to the paper on the sidelines of a two-day workshop organized in Tamale by Participatory Development Associates, a civil society organization (CSO) to enhance the relationship between media practitioners and Traditional Authorities in Northern Ghana for effective development, they said no man in the area wanted to marry the young women because of the pricey dowry involved, adding that men often came around, took advantage of them and when they became pregnant, they denied responsibility. 

They explained that even in situations when a man accepted responsibility of a woman’s pregnancy and took her to his house to stay with him till she delivered, they lived together afterwards for many years with the man still unable to dowry her.  

Some of the men, the Bawku Puanab said, even thought that they bought the women they married when eventually they were able to get the four cows to dowry them, saying “that is not good as it makes the women serve as slaves to the men in the marriage. Also, the benefit of the marriage is that all four cows go to the father of the bride. But sadly, some of them use the cows to marry again and this has led to increase in polygamous marriages in the area.”

The Queen Mother further disclosed that there were situations one could find a woman marrying for about three to four times. “For instance, when a woman marries a man who has been able to pay two cows, the parents of the woman could later ask her to marry another man who also has two cows.” 

Meanwhile, light seemed to be at the end of the tunnel as BElim-Wusa Development Agency, a Bawku based CSO recently took the matter up as a serious advocacy issue. The advocacy, this reporter gathered, brought together Traditional Authorities, Opinion Leaders, Assembly Members and all who matter, to try to find a lasting solution to the looming marriage drought.    

Following the advocacy program, which the Bawku Puanab and Chief of Nyariga corroborated, a committee was formed to look into the matter and made recommendations that could possibly and permanently address the problem of high cost of dowry.

According to the two Traditional Authorities, the committee’s report eventually recommended that the four cows initially charged as payment for dowry should be reduced to two, which all the Traditional Councils in the BONABOTO and Bawku areas unanimously endorsed.

To further give it an impetus, the report had since been endorsed and duly recognized by the Upper East Regional and National Houses of Chiefs.