Insist On A Prenup

He said: Brother Gbenga, Let me tell you a story of how a Prenup preserves your life from an early grave and also protects your resources from emotional vultures fleecing you off your feelings for them.

I lodged in a hotel in 2019 somewhere in Lagos. It was a good hotel and the price was fair.

The room service attendants of the hotel, however, were very unprofessional in their conduct

They padded the bill, solicited for tips, and would beg you for money brazenly. If you refuse to tip them or give them any money based on principle, they will start giving you attitude.

If you call room service, nobody will show up. If you walk into their restaurant to make an order, you will wait a long time before you are served, and if you go to their bar for a drink, you will be the last person to be attended to.

They had a terrible and unprofessional service culture.

I decided to take it up with their management. I am a business owner too, and I could see the amount of money the owner of the hotel was pouring into it to keep its doors open. The attitude of his staff, however, would eventually force the business to close down.

I requested to see the manager in my second week at the hotel.

By this time i had documented all the evidence of the atrocities of his staff

I had also googled him to know as much as possible about him and his business

We met on a Thursday and I told him all my observations with recorded audio and video evidence

I also gave him bills that didn't match the receipts given to me by those who had attended to me.

He told me he would do something about it immediately.

The next day, he sacked all the staff members involved and employed new ones.

He then instructed one of the new ones, a lady named

Jasmine is to wait on me and ensure that all my needs are met. (Nothing sexual or unprofessional, please. I know you will post on X, and that street takes things off point very easily. So I am clarifying that.)

Jasmine was like my PA while I was in Lagos for the business I came in to do, which was to scout ten teen footballers and if possible, sign them up on a contract for my football club which was in one of the Middle Eastern countries

Jasmine knew Lagos, and she was of great help in my interactions with the locals.

This was how we got talking, and she told me about her relationship with a young man named Wisdom, who was working with one of the pharmaceutical companies and their struggles to raise enough money to get married.

In all, I spent three months in Nigeria, and she worked with me for about ten weeks. I made sure she was compensated properly in foreign currency before returning to my base.

When I got to my base, I got an email from her

In the mail, she pushed for me to please help her man get a job abroad

I ignored it.

I didn't want the relationship to go beyond a professional one

Two years after this, she called me out of the blue and told me she had obtained a master's degree form with UNILAG and would like me to support her with the school fees.

I didn't think twice before sending her triple the amount she requested.

She also asked if I could get her a job

She said her job at the hotel had turned toxic due to the behaviour of her new supervisor

She said she wanted to resign, and she did.

We started talking on and off.

Nothing romantic, but the discussion was stepping out of neutrality and professionalism into personal issues.

She spoke to me a lot about Wisdom, the man she was dating, and how he was always mounting pressure on her to make her own money so that they could build a life together.

Wisdom was advancing in his career, and he was given an official car and an accommodation at work

He, however, refused to marry Jasmine as long as she was not gainfully employed

Jasmine took this as a sign of a lack of love from wisdom. She broke off the relationship and focused on her studies.

When she was done with her master's, she got a job in one of the states in the Southeast.

She kept in touch

When she got to this new job in the Southeast, she started dating the manager of the company.

He was rich after a fashion within the Nigerian socioeconomic space.

He lived in a duplex, had three cars, and had some money he could spend for free

He was generous, and he paid attention to her needs

She spent most of her time in his duplex, securing her space as his wife to be

This went on for about a year until the man's wife and children arrived in Nigeria from the United States of America.

It was an unexpected twist in her story.

She had to move out of his apartment in a hurry. A lot of the staff members in their office knew about her relationship with the boss, and the news soon filtered to the boss's wife

The woman insisted she must be sacked, and the man had no option but to sack her.

She also had to change her church because the man and his family attended the same church, and she lived in constant fear of running into the woman.

So she left Enugu and returned to Lagos.

When she got to Lagos, she joined a church, became very born again in her conduct, and got a job as an executive assistant to the pastor of the church she was attending.

By this time, I had known her for about five years. She would call, text, or send me an email once in a while. sometimes when I have something to do in Nigeria, I would reach out to her, and she would get it done for me for a fee.

I got a better contract as a scout with another football club in Germany.

I needed to return to West Africa to scout out some talent in seven countries, including Nigeria.

I called Jasmine to share the good news. She asked if I wouldn't mind a video call, and I obliged.

We talked for a bit, and she asked me to take her on a tour of my hotel suite.

I obliged her

She used to be in the hotel business, and I know many hoteliers like seeing the standard of other hotels so that they could aspire for better in their line of work.

I arrived in Nigeria in June,

Jasmine was at the airport to welcome me.

Her attitude towards me was very warm, and she came with an overnight travel bag

When I told her I wanted to stay in the hotel where she used to work, she begged me not to

She said if I did so, she would not be able to stay with me

It was her queen's gambit, and I allowed her to play that hand

That was how we became lovers. She was thirty-two years old. her career had not taken off as she wanted, and her love life had crashed into oblivion

She said she was staying with her older sister's family in Lekki, Lagos, and her older sister had almost turned her into a housemaid

She said staying with me would give her some respite and restore a bit of dignity to her before her sister and her sister's husband

She was a good friend, a fantastic listener. She has a good brain in her head, and her counsel is always well considered. She also has this sixth sense about people and could easily tell you when people are being shady or forthright.

Being from Nigeria, her wealth of knowledge in this way helped me a lot with my business.

We grew very close. We toured West Africa together. We fell in love, and I proposed to marry her.

Now I came from money. My family had owned wineries and vineyards for several generations.

I have also done very well for myself in my career as a FIFA and UEFA-licensed football scout

It was only ideal that we sign a prenup

When I told her about the prenup, she said I was not in any way different from Wisdom (her former boyfriend).

I asked her why she would say so, and she said I was prioritizing money over my love for her and making her look like a gold digger.

She said she wouldn't sign a prenup

It has to be either all or nothing

I really loved Jasmine, so i told her I would travel home to have a discussion with my parents on the prenup issue

I told her she couldn't travel with me because my father would accuse me of being under her influence.

I also told her that my parents and I would most likely place a call to her during the discussion, and my father would most likely ask her some questions

I encouraged her to be candid and forthright with my father, as this could help him change his mind about the prenup

On the day we made the call, Jasmine was back with his sister at Lekki

After we had exchanged pleasantries, I introduced her to my parents

My father greeted her warmly, and so did my mother

My father then told her to take us on a tour of her sister's house and introduce us to the family on a video call

She left her room and took us from one room to another

We met her sister, the sister's husband was not at home

We also met with all the little children in the house

It was a meeting of great fun and laughter

However, throughout the call, Jasmine and her sister were conversing in their native language and English language

The call went on for almost three hours. It's all pleasant. My father asked no awkward questions. It was just talking about family history, level of education, exposure, my job, her plans, how many children she wanted to have, my father's businesses, and family tree, etc

When we were done, my father asked for the video recording of the call and sent it to a friend of his from Nigeria to help transcribe the conversation between Jasmine and her sister.

The transcription was done, and the result was very revealing.

Jasmine's sister asked her  when she took the video call to her room, "If this was the rich fool who wanted to employ a wife instead of marrying one the proper way."

Jasmine replied, "Onye Iberibe amaghi n'ada nne ya bu obia," or something like that, which means "This fool does not know that he is playing with someone with a superior plan. Or This is an amateur playing against a master."

That was all my father had to see.

He insisted on a prenup.

Jasmine threw a tantrum, called me names, and accused me of being a user who really didn't love her but only wanted to turn her into a baby factory. She said my father wanted an heir for his empire, but wanted a slave to carry the heir.

We parted ways after all that drama.

I got married a year later to a 27-year-old Italian princess. We have three children, and we are happy. She signed the prenup eagerly as I would have done if she were the one with the assets to protect

It was never about fidelity or unfaithfulness. it was about judging intentions. How would a man or woman know if he or she is being loved for his or her money other than for himself or herself?

You take the money off the table.

If he or she is still consistent without the money on the table, you know you have hit the jackpot.

Thank you for bearing with the long read, sir.

PS: There are several reasons to sign a prenup, especially as a man or woman of means.

If your children are born into money (trust fund babies), you must protect them by insisting they sign a prenup, too.

There are too many vultures out there hoping to trade good looks and a bad character for years of sweat and hard work.

Protect your assets from these buccaneers!

-GSW-