Precious Chikwendu, has told a Customary Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja her ex-husband, Femi Fani-Kayode never consummated his six-year relationship with her because he allegedly had erectile dysfunction.
During the hearing on Tuesday, Ms Chikwendu said she was forced to remain celibate during the cohabitation and alleged that the four children she birthed in her affair with Mr Fani-Kayode were conceived via artificial insemination.
She prayed the court to declare that she was never married to Fani-Kayode because, contrary to his claims, he neither paid her bride price nor performed customary or statutory marriage rites with her. She is seeking access to the four children she bore for him.
Ms Chikwendu (the petitioner) made the averments in her November 29, 2021 “Application for issuance of civil summons/plaint” against Mr Fani-Kayode (the respondent) in suit FCT/CCK8/01/043/2021 filed by her counsel, Abiodun E. Olusanya.
She is seeking the following reliefs:
“An order declaring that there was no customary marriage between the Petitioner and the respondent (despite their six-year cohabitation) under the Nanka, Orumba North, Anambra State of Igbo native law and customs.
“Alternatively, assuming by the evidence during the trial the court finds that there was a customary marriage between parties:
“An order dissolving the customary marriage between the petitioner and the respondent, forthwith.
“An order granting the Petitioner access to and custody of the four children of the cohabitation between parties, especially during their academic calendar.
“An order ordering the respondent to be continuously responsible for the academic, medical, clothing and welfare of the four children of the cohabitation.
“An order ordering the respondent to release and return the Petitioner’s property.
The property includes the petitioner’s certificates and documents, trophies from the United Nations pageantry, Red Range Rover car, registered under her foundation name and the foundation’s certificates, and the petitioner’s picture.
Others are the petitioner’s mother’s burial videos and souvenirs, mother’s certificates and documents, the petitioner’s clothes and personal belongings including gadgets, sewing machines left at the children’s play area, and petitioner’s fridge and kitchen gadgets for her food company, Mommy Pee Food.
Chikwendu said her relationship with Fani-Kayode, her former “estranged cohabiter,” was full of “woes, lies, deceits, quarrels, assaults, battery, and domestic violence.
Others are lack of trust and absence of love, public disgrace and shame, and absence of sex due to the inability to sexually perform and intolerable behaviour of the respondent.”
She contended that there was never a marriage between the parties on the ground, among others, that the respondent “has continuously behaved in such a way that the Petitioner cannot reasonably be expected to continue to live with the respondent any further or formally enter into any form of traditional marriage with him.”
She added: “From the inception of the cohabitation, the Respondent has been a violent person who attacks the petitioner and her family members at will without provocation.”
She averred that in 2016 when EFCC raided Fani-Kayode’s house, she found his marriage certificate with his third wife, Regina.
She said she confronted him with it and requested to see the subsequent divorce certificate, following which he allegedly confessed that he had yet to do so.
Ms Chinwendu added: “At every attempt, the petitioner made to have sexual intercourse with the respondent, there was never erection of the respondent’s penis/manhood and penetration was frustrating.
“During such periods of frustration and sexual desire, the petitioner would be left with the choice of merely rubbing herself on the respondent, to have the slightest bit of relief.
“The petitioner then insisted parties should seek medical help for the respondent, and on visiting the family doctor, the respondent claimed he was diagnosed of having a cyst on his manhood, which is not allowing the respondent to have erection and or perform sexually.
“The respondent was supposedly placed on Cyprotab and the doctor suggested that the respondent should go and decide when he wishes to remove/untangle the cyst.
“Few days after the visit to the doctor, the respondent informed the petitioner that he had discussed with Regina and she had prayed over it, that the respondent should not do the operation, else he would die.
“The respondent never took the cyprotab medication, but any time the petitioner tried to engage the respondent in sexual activities, the respondent would claim his penis/manhood was paining him and then drink the medication.
“The petitioner bought sex toys for the respondent, but the respondent refused to use it and warned the petitioner never to suggest it again.”
Ms Chikwendu averred further that since August 2020 that she walked out of the cohabitation with the Respondent, she had been continuously denied access to her children and her children have been continuously deprived of parental motherly care and protection.
She claimed that Mr Fani-Kayode was in the habit of not paying his domestic staff/workers/nannies, “which leaves the workers angry and they could unleash and or transfer their anger on the children, they may kill any of the children any day, if the children are left with the respondent.
“Most of the domestic staff/workers/nannies that are not paid their wages, usually resign and run away without informing anyone and considering the security situation, the workers could kidnap any of the children.
“Currently the respondent is in court with some of the former domestic staff/workers for non payment of salaries and abuse.”
Mr Fani-Kayode is yet to file a response to the application.
Ms Chikwendu and Mr Fani-Kayode have been locked in a messy legal battle over the custody of their four sons since they split in 2020.
