The customs of widow cleansing and widow inheritance are practiced in several communities throughout Africa.
According to tradition, Luo widows are expected to engage in sexual intercourse with a “cleanser,” without the use of a condom, in order to remove the impurity ascribed to her after her husband’s death.
Luo couples, including widows, are also expected to engage in sex preceding specific agricultural activities, building homes, funerals, weddings, and other significant cultural and social events.
A wife inheritor from Obama village Migori County, went to meet with his creator after he committed suicide on Monday morning after a widow he inherited slept outside the homestead.
The deceased identified as Milton was found dangling on a rafter of the widow’s sitting room after using a rope.
“We quarreled on Saturday where he promised to kill me, on Sunday when he came home I chose sleep elsewhere as he has a very nasty temper,” Tina Anyango, the widow said.
She said in the morning, her children came over to her with information that there was issues to settle at home.
“When I arrived at my homestead I found people milling around, he had committed suicide,” Anyango said.
According to Anyango, she knew the deceased who is a Luhya for only seven months a period which the man had threatened severally to kill her including slashing her with a panga in an attempt to kill her.
A police officer in charge of Obama Police Thomas Ongaga said the woman had reported the issue with them.
“On Saturday the couple were at Obama center together, we thought the lady could have alerted us for arrest but she didn’t. officers thought they had made up,”Ongaga said.
He said the man chose to commit suicide after his lover slept outside the homestead.
Obama Nyumba Kumi elder Paul Mboya, said the man was not known in the village and started staying with the woman for only three months.
“We think the man is a Luhya who hails from western, we are still establishing his home area,” Mboya said.
The body of the deceased was picked by police and taken to Migori Level Four hospital mortuary.
Do you think this tradition that harms community will ever be eradicated?