Does Polyamory Test Potential Leaders?

There has been controversy recently in some African countries over polygyny and leaders being polygynous, mostly because of some monogamists who want to portray anything nonmonogamous as wrong. Outsiders are more apt to be concerned about a lack of equality for women. It is the position of this blog that marriage being a fundamental right, the polygamous freedom to marry should not be denied nor discriminated against, under the system that includes gender equality, equal freedom to not marry and to divorce, and domestic violence protections. A woman should be free to marry a man who is already married, as long as all agree, but she should also be free to marry one or more women, or more than one man, or multiple men and women.

Gimba Abdullahi Liman wrote an opinion about polygamy (polygyny) in Nigeria.

Successful polygamy is all about ensuring that you can follow through on all of your promises and never over promise but always go the extra mile to exceed your wives' expectation.

This is good advice for any committed relationship.

Here's what got my attention...

Polygamy is important because it is a tool for national development and a pre-requisite for learning accurate method of leadership.

Polygamy is mainly found in west , east and North Africa. In Sudan for instance, it was encouraged by the president in 2001 to increase the population size.

Most Nigerian cultures see the number of children one has as a sign of wealth. Thus the more children a family has, the more influential and powerful it is perceived. It was only during the colonial age that polygamy was perceived as a taboo.

Nevertheless, many of our leaders today mis-handle our economic, mineral and human resource, may be because of inadequate knowledge of home judgement (Polygamy) as such it become difficulty to govern nation.

Although the idea of competition among mothers (wives) concerning attention and status strongly depend on the husband's established rule and regulation in the home.

Polygamy therefore offers grooming on leadership and should be considered as one of the parameters of choosing our leaders.

While the essay is decidedly patriarchal in perspective, there is a useful concept that can be redeemed from it. In some countries, male leaders are openly and officially polygynous. In many others, it is expected that a married male leader will have a mistress and they will do public things together such as sharing dinner. In countries like the US, married politicians are attacked if they are not monogamous.

Once we have full marriage equality, openly polyamorous and polygamous people will start to be elected to office, and that will be a good thing. A person, regardless of gender, who maintains a polyamorous relationship, whether the relationship is polygamous (married) or not, can demonstrate people skills and management skills of benefit to a leader. All other things being the same, I'd definitely think better of (for example) a male politician who openly has three relatively happy wives or is in a polycule with a man and a woman than a male politician who publicly claims monogamy with a wife (and has privately committed to her as monogamous) but secretly carries on affairs or meets other men for sex in airport restrooms, claiming he has "a wide stance" when he is busted.

Polyamory can be a testing ground for leadership.

Does a person try to unfairly manipulate others? Or does she demonstrate maturity and consensus-building? Think about it.