BAUCHI- VICE Chairman, Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) Bauchis State, Rev. Okafor Efemesi has condemned gay marriage and practice, describing it as sacrilege and a ploy by the demonic world to destroy family being the foundation of every society.
He also advocated for the establishment of the Ministry of Family Affairs at both the state and federal levels to address various family and marriage matters, independent of the Ministry of Women Affairs. Speaking to newsmen shortly after the launch of two marriage books authored by Mrs. B.O.Efemesi and the giving of merit award to some women and men who have excelled in their marriages, he advised the government to consider an endowment to assist young Nigerians who could not afford financial and material obligations to marriage.
He lamented that because of the moral degeneration and the information super high way, some western values alien to African values have been transmitted to the third world countries, including some of the destroyed western values and its catastrophic effects. “
“Therefore, we in Africa have to come back to our roots to preserve our values (family) from western influence” Efemesi who is a marriage counselor and a retired lecturer said, “for instance, gay marriage, we now have gay Bishops. These are men that marry men and they are now consecrating them as pastors, Bishops. This is sacrilege and it shows the extent to which the entire society has degenerated” He maintained that the bedrock of the society was the home, ‘‘if the families are cohesive and coherent, it will fight the HIV/AIDS scourge” adding that if the government wants to fight the pandemic, it must do something urgently about family in form of a legislation.
According to him, transfer of spouses without considering the effect of it on family and retrenchment has led to many broken homes, exposing the children to the HIV/AIDS scourge. “Another thing is that marriage is becoming too expensive in Nigeria. Many young men have not married because they are scared of the money.
If government really wants to fight the HIV/AIDS, the Federal Government can set aside fund to assist those who wants to marry and have no means.” Emefesi suggested that government could also regulate the bride price by fixing an amount of money to be paid which could be affordable to many persons, condemning what he described as commercialization of bride price in Nigeria. He believes that if the government could do those things to encourage marriage among the youths and encourage families to live together, the fight against HIV/AIDS scourge would be won.
![[Image]](http://news.biafranigeriaworld.com/..\..\..\images\vlogo.gif){kind=small}
