Pretoria: Soon enough, women in South Africa will be allowed to marry more than one husband, just like men are permitted to have multiple wives. The move has been proposed by the country’s Department of Home Affairs, which is looking at creating a new marriage act and trying to make marriage more inclusive. According to the Green Paper on Marriages, a policy document published this week, the current marriage act does not promote equality and the current marriage legislation is discriminatory as it does not recognise Hindu, Jewish, Muslim and Rastafarian marriages. The policy document also called for polyandry to be legally recognised as a form of marriage, BBC reported.
Many human rights activists and other groups were consulted on the key issues, before drafting the proposal. The human rights activists “submitted that equality demands that polyandry be legally recognized as a form of marriage.”
However, conservatives and some religious groups are miffed with the proposal. Despite the fact that South Africa allows same-sex marriages and polygamy for men, many opposed polyandry, saying it will ‘destroy African culture.’
Leader of the opposition African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP) Kenneth Meshoe said the proposed law would ‘destroy society’ if the same marriage rights were extended to women, as per a report in The Independent.
Among the opponents is businessman and TV personality Musa Mseleku, who himself has four wives.
“This will destroy African culture. What about the children of those people? How will they know their identity? The woman cannot now take the role of the man. It’s unheard of. Will the woman now pay lobola [bride price] for the man. Will the man be expected to take her surname?”Mseleku told BBC.
South Africans have until the end of June to comment on the department’s proposals.