This archive report was first published on 4 October 2019.
On October 4, 2019, the Meru council of elders, traditionally known as Njuri Ncheke, revealed plans to regulate outrageously high dowries demanded by Meru in laws.
The council expressed their concern over a situation they described as grossly outdated, where young men seeking to marry from the region were discouraged and resorted to bachelorhood after being asked to part with absurd amounts of money, like 1 million, for dowry payments.
According to Njuri Ncheke's secretary general, Josephat Murangiri, 'Dowry should never be the basis to prevent young men and women from getting lifetime partners.'
The council aims to bring sanity to the dowry menace by infiltrating dowry payments to ensure they are aligned to modern criteria.
The decision was reached after a series of gender-based violence in the area, with 65% of women reportedly having a chance of experiencing violence from an intimate partner, contributed by dowry payments which make one to feel like they own another.
The elders also stated that the high dowry rates were making their women lack marketability, causing them to remain single, while the thwarted young men resorted to impregnating minors, wasting their lives in the process.
