The Majority Leader of the House of Representatives, Alhassan Ado-Doguwa, has condemned those who criticised him for showing off his four wives and 27 children on the floor of the chamber, warning that it was against his private life.
Ado-Doguwa, who said he was allowed as an adherent of Islam to marry that number of wives, nothing that it was a common thing in the northern part of the country dominated by Muslim Hausa and Fulani.
According to him, his father, who died in 2019 at 86, was survived by over 40 children, one of whom was a four-year-old.
Ado-Doguwa, who was in the National Assembly between 1992 and 1993 in the botched Third Republic, has been a member of the House since 1999, representing Tudun-Wada/Doguwa Federal Constituency of Kano State.
On January 29, 2020, Ado-Doguwa was among the six new members who were sworn in after winning reruns declared by courts.
The ceremony had become dramatic when Ado-Doguwa had spent about one hour to thank the leadership and members of the House, the All Progressives Congress and his four wives and 27 children, some of whom were in the chamber.
The announcement by the lawmaker had generated cheers and applause from the audience.
The Speaker, Femi Gbajabiamila, who interjected the lawmaker, had said he wanted to be sure if the Majority Leader actually said “27 children and still counting.” The comment also generated laughter in the chamber.
Ado-Doguwa later “apologised” to Governor Abdullahi Ganduje of Kano State for having four wives when the governor only had one.
Speaking with the leadership of the House Press Corps, Ado-Doguwa said, “My father left behind over 40 kids. He died only last year. Amongst the children he left, one of them is less than four years old. An 86-year-old man left a child of less than four years old for me and I’m catering for him by the grace of God.
The lawmaker described his wives as legitimate, indigenous and not ‘imported’.
