Men who are never accompanied by their wife to public places

A fortnight ago, Jane Muturi*, 27, who is a communications officer in blue chip firm received an odd request from his ex-boyfriend. He wanted her to accompany him to a social event. While still in good terms, the man has since married and she had since moved on. It was a little weird.

"He just wanted me to look prim and pretty and behave like a couple," she says. And she accompanied him.

The man is part of class of men who you will never see in an office party or public event.You will be forgiven to think that he is a senior bachelor. If he has a family, it is largely anonymous or a figment of your imagination. May be the wife likes her privacy. Or as it is often the case, she has been consigned to an anonymous life where the marriage is  purely transactional.

You know. All she does is get money from the husband to pay school fees for the young ones. Or pay rent and buy utilities. But in social functions, you will never see them together, even in church, they will not arrive in the same car.

"All happy families are alike, each unhappy family is unhappy is unhappy in its own way," opens Leo Tolstoy tome Anna Karenina. The greatest unhappiness in marriage invariably stems from spousal neglect and in that aspect, women are doubly affected given the boorishly patriarchal society and women who are still largely dependent on men-even though this is changing.

 There are women who are permanently domesticated. Their husbands for reasons about to be enumerated here can never be seen with them in public.

Why are some men not proud of their wives?

1. Not educated or polished enough

This is common with politicians. No sooner they get elected that they marry a second wife or get a hotter mistress to show up with in social events. This was exemplified in Chinua Achebe's 'A Man Of The People'. The MP, Odili Samalu disposed his wife who had become matronly and unpolished for a younger, fashionable, presentable and  beautiful wife who he snatched from his former pupil setting up the stage for the overriding conflict in the book.

Many future African politicians have used the African tradition to justify taking up a second wife as soon as they become richer. Same thing with Kenya. Notice how the MPs are hjardly with their spouses in public unless they are are sure they have stunning looks?

2. Not beautiful enough

In the eyes of some men, their wives are never beautiful enough.

"You are embarrassed to walk around with her. Your peers will judge you harshly, so you spare yourself the trouble," says Kenneth Musungu*, who works at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

"When you don't have confidence in her, you spare her and leave her at home."

Men asked, confirmed as much: When not sure of your wife's physical qualities, you cannot go out with her.

3. The woman is too beautiful

Sometimes, the woman is too beautiful. And the man is too insecure.

"Sometimes a man is afraid of competition from other men, or the attention the wife will draw.

"Perhaps he feels that his wife is too pretty and might get a lot of attention from his friends. Man is a jealous being by nature," says Derek Gbenga, an image consultant who spoke to the Nairobian.

This class of insecure men has been known to do things that damage the confidence of the woman so as to bring her down as Bobby Brown was famously accused of ruining Whitney Houston's life. Some will ensure that the wife has given birth to as many kids and as quickly as possible as a way of taming her.

"Women should be wary of such men. An insecure man can ruin a woman's life. So women need be on the lookout," cautions Komu Mwati.

4. Fallen out of love

Not many men have the patience and the wisdom to know that marriage needs a lot of reinvention. Often love grows cold to freezing point. Atthat level, even the glue of pretense cannot work. You start hating your wife so much, the less time you spend with her the better.

"Sometimes it happens that you married her for love or infatuation. Now you have a change of heart," says Jared Mulei* a middle-aged photojournalist.

"So rather than kick her out, you sympathize with her, you let her stay rather than go out there and be without an husband given you are the one who made a mother out of her," he adds further, " If she is say 42, and she has three children, she may not have a place to go. So you let her stay for the sake of children.

Since you cannot force love, the man swallows his pride, sticks with her rather than choosing her easy way out. But the woman will remain cloistered at home and the man will go on scavenging out there, sometimes even marrying another woman. Sometimes even without the knowledge of the official wife.

Mulei, notes that when women fall out of love they are less forgiving, and patient especially if they make their money, he says citing the case of a famous female politician who abandoned and denied her 'husband' who later died in oblivion.

Mulei thinks for that, men should be congratulated for their willingness to remain with the wife even when the love stops.

5. You married too early, now you have changed your mind

Sometimes, as man you may marry too early before you have explored and sampled what life can serve. Later you might change your mind and sees flaws in the woman and a certain hatred and disdain can develop out of that.

"Men who marry early when they are not psychologically mature tend to drift from their wives after the biological and sociological responsibility have worn down their wives, which in this case happens when the wife is fairly young," says sociologist Komu Mwati.

If he married in his early 20s and the wife bears three children by 30, she will not be the same woman she married and if not satisfied, she will drift from the wife and might not be proud to be seen with her in public.