Nollywood legend Pete Edochie has set social media on fire after warning men never to kneel with a ring and never to live on a wife’s money, saying both moves surrender the headship of the family and impacts the relationship’s future.
The 79-year-old actor spoke on the Curiosity Made Me Ask show hosted by content creator Adebayo Abidemi, popularly known as Isbae U or Bae U Barbie. Drawing on 57 years of marriage to Josephine Edochie, he framed the comments as hard-earned counsel, not a joke.
“I want you to listen properly. This is wisdom from somebody who has been in that institution for almost 60 years. I have been married for the past 57 years,” he said.
On provision, Edochie was blunt. He told men not to pray for a season where the wife becomes the one putting food on the table.
“Don’t pray for your wife to feed you. If things change and your wife has to feed you for two or three days, you would want to take poison. The kind of insult that will be heaped on you because your wife is feeding you, don’t ever think about it.”
He tied the warning to what he called a man’s traditional duty to provide, arguing that financial dependence opens the door to ridicule at home.
He then turned to proposals. Kneeling with a ring, he said, is not romance. It is surrender.
“If you step down on your knee and you offer a woman a ring, you are conceding headship of the family to that woman.”
When the host pressed him to walk the line back, he refused.
“I will not take it back.”
Edochie linked the gesture to Western marriage culture and high divorce rates.
“Have you ever asked yourself why marriages don’t last in Western countries? Oh yeah, but that’s the reason. So, if your wife decides to divorce you, she’s entitled to maybe half or 75 per cent of what you have.”
The veteran has made versions of this argument for years, insisting kneeling is foreign to Igbo custom and that in church a person kneels only before a superior. He has said he did not kneel to propose to his wife. Those older remarks now sit beside the new interview and have fuelled another round of praise and outrage.
In the same conversation he also declined to name a favourite actor, saying he sees himself as bigger than his colleagues, and brushed off claims that others outrank him in industry seniority.
Read “I’m Bigger Than Every Nollywood Actor!” — Pete Edochie Declares
The marriage comments have split viewers. Supporters hail him as a cultural elder defending male headship and African tradition. Critics say the language is harsh, dated, and dismissive of women who work and of couples who share bills.