THE SITUATION IN THE OTHER ROOM

By Osondu Ahirika

The Other Room can either be exciting and a paradise on earth or a boring, lonely, tense and isolated one.
 A room where there is no shoulder to cry on. Where the occupant is alienated, estranged and holed away by the trappings and protocol of power from her lover and husband. Where she sees other associates and courtiers usurp the time and attention or her husband making her a mere spectator.

As such, there are First Ladies who will never restrain themselves to the other room. President Muhammadu Buhari, by happenstance, reopened the debate on a woman's place, when he said, his dashing and delectable wife, Aisha, "...belongs in his kitchen, his living room, and the other room."
It is no longer news that The President made this assertion while on a state visit to Germany, from where he had reacted to a controversial interview, granted BBC Hausa service by his wife, during a joint press briefing with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He reiterated his viewpoint that, his wife should stay out of politics.

That is a difficult thing for First Ladies to do in this age- staying confined in the other room. Although President Buhari did state he will scrap the Office of the First Lady, what happened was a semantic change. He simply supplanted the term with, Office of Wife of the President. Aisha is therefore playing the role and will hardly restrain herself to the other room.
Other First Ladies have had their battle to stay out of the room and hug the limelight, or quit it completely. Recall the hectic drill, former Governor of Adamawa State, Vice Admiral Murtala Nyako faced, sorting his harem out, when none of his spouses will stay indoors.
As a true muslim, he had four wives. Hajia Zainab Nyako, Dr. Halima Nyako, Justice Binta Nyako and Hajiya Asmua Nana Nyako. All four insisted on and were using the letter headed paper of the Adamawa State Office of the First Lady and their official cars bore the plate number ADGMH 1.
To keep the peace and treat all 'equally', as prescribed by his Faith, the old soldier assigned to each wife a portfolio.

Accordingly, Justice Binta Nyako was First Lady in-charge of Abuja Affairs; Dr. Halina Nyako was the First Lady supervising the health sector,  Hajia Zainab Nyako was made the first lady in-charge of Political Affairs and Mobilisation, while Asamau Nana
Nyako operated as the first lady in-charge of the Home Front. She was the youngest wife I guess, and that is why the Home Front, which habours the Other Room was left in her purview.
Like President Buhari said Aisha's duty is to take care of him, Asamau Nana Nyako got the real job of the quartet in my view. They all lived happily ever after.

Another First Lady rejected the other room for more disturbing reasons. I here refer to Mrs Clara Chime, erstwhile First Lady of Enugu State. The nation was jolted when Mrs Chime wrote public letter laced with pain, humiliation, frustration and suffering. Mrs. Chime, then wife of Governor Sullivan Chime. In the said letter, Clara stated that, after getting married to Governor Chime in Oct. 2008, she hadn't  slept with him(in that other room) for over four years. Disclosing her ordeal and desperate situation, she said that even President Goodluck Jonathan and First Lady Patience Jonathan had intervened to no avail. Charging Nigerians to prevail on her husband to set her free, Clara  revealed, she was held hostage, like a captive or prisoner in the other room.
In her Letter, she wrote in part, “My father is late, my Mum and few of
my siblings are confused and have done all kinds of prayers they know of.
Three of my siblings prefers me dead than to see me leave the Government
House(read, LEAVE THE OTHER ROOM).” The Enugu First Lady also disclosed that, she has been introduced to two psychiatrists whose names she gave as Dr. Onwukwe and Dr. Agumo, who
have prescribed “all kinds of drugs, "... keeping me acute depressed and also drives me into hallucinations.” The doctors, she added, are scared of her husband the Governor, to whom
nobody can tell the truth. She wanted to leave all the glitz and glamour of the other room to exhale in the free world. It took the outrage, umbrage and outcry of Nigerians and the National Human Rights Commission to get Governor Chime release Clara from the other room in Government House, where she was quarantined. She has since resumed her normal life.

On April 11th, 2008, the first daughter of ex-President Ibrahim Babangida, Aishat, (popularly called Aisha Babangida) married the now former governor of Zamfara State, Alhaji Aliyu
Shinkafi in Minna Niger state. She was First Lady. By 2013, she divorced him and left the other room of the ex governor.

Do you also recall, then Governor of Bauchi State, Mallam Isa Yuguda expelled his third wife, and First Lady, Mariya Ruafi, in divorce, effectively kicking her out of The Other Room in June 2010.
First Lady Mariya, returned to Bauchi from a medical trip to Germany when Yuguda ordered her out of the house(read, The Other Room), giving her a deadline of two hours or police eviction. According to reports, Governor Yuguda didn't allow her remove any property from her room and also instructed the police to retrieve her vehicles and other gifts. No reason was given for the breakup.
In Oct 2011, the marriage between the daughter of Late President Umaru Yar'adua, Zainad, to former Governor Saidu Usman Dakingari hit the rocks. The Ex First Lady of Kebbi State hastily quit the Other Room with bitterness and disgust and returned to her fathers house. There are many more.

Folks', The Other Room is not as commonplace as it sounds. For me, it is the most sensitive place in a man's heart and home. I liken it to, The Situation Room. The United States made the term Situation Room famous. Located in  The White House, The Situation Room, is officially known as the John F. Kennedy Conference Room. It serves as the intelligence management center. The Situation Room  is run by the National Security Council staff for the use of the President of the United States and his advisors(including the National Security Advisor, the Homeland Security Advisor and the White House Chief of Staff) to monitor and deal with crises at home and abroad and to conduct secure communications with outside (often overseas) persons. The Situation Room is equipped with secure, advanced communications equipment for the President to maintain command and control of U.S. forces around the world.

That's how powerful The Other Room, which President Buhari referred to, is, for the discerning.
It is in The Other Room that my wife acts as my counsellor, Best friend, confidant, comforter, Special Adviser, Senior Special Assistant, Minister of Interior, Intercessor, playmate, business and prayer partner. That is where she rules my world as the First Lady and Queen of my heart.
Earlier, I accused Mr President of being old fashioned, archaic and a misogynist. Not anymore. Its his wife he is talking about here, not anyone else.
Finally, I don't know who wrote this poem, but I give it to Nigerians, and whoever did. We are a creative people.

Its a well scripted poem titled, THE OTHER ROOM..it reads:

The other room Where a woman pretends To be weak, So that a man
Can believe  he is strong.
Where a woman  pretends To be foolish, So that a man Can  say he is wise.
Where a woman  stoops, So that a man can conquer.
The other room, Where gods of  men
Become  worshipers  of women.
Where leaders of thought,  Become  minions Of the bleeders  of blood.
Where wielders of power Succumb to power.

The other room, Where the brashness  of testosterone, Yields  to the  bra straps  of estrogen.
Where the bravado  of masculinity
Is tamed by the wiles  of femininity.
Where the turgid, Becomes  the flaccid

Three rooms In a house. One in which  a man Believes he is king. Two in which He realizes A woman  is god.!

*The Other Room, In the other room
Hardened men become beggars
The queen becomes the king too
The king, just a beggarly page
In the other room, We cry for joy
Beg to be injured, For there, we enjoy pain.
In the other room, We beg to suck milkless breasts, Accept every proposal
And promise any thing
In the other room, Fate of nations are decided, Destinies of men are fixed
Death warrants are signed.
The other room. What a room! "

Folks,' I need only add, that is the Situation in the other Room.