Mass Weddings in Northern Nigeria and the Politics of Illusory Development

Last week, the Zamfara state government organised a mass wedding for up to 100 couples, mainly young people from across the state. Framed as a state welfare initiative, the government explained that it was a means to “meaningfully intervene in the well-being” of the less privileged. As a token of goodwill, the Deputy Governor of the state, who stood in for the Governor, promised a N200,000 dowry payment for each bride, and N50,000 for each bride to supplement small enterprises in their homes. 

As atavistic as the idea of marrying off vulnerable masses — underage, impoverished, war-displaced, orphaned and formally illiterate — may come across, state-sponsored mass weddings of this order and grime have become a matter of administrative course in certain areas of Nigeria. In Kano State, for instance, no less  than 2,000 couples were betrothed under what was called a government “mass wedding programme.” Governor Kwankwaso had instituted the initiative as an effort to curtail “prostitution” among young girls. In a 2025 Report, Punch observed that Governor Abdullahi Ganduje organised a state marriage for “1,520 divorcees and by October 2023 and by 2023, Governor Yusuf conducted another mass wedding for 1,800 couples, in addition to another batch of 1,800 couples who tied the knot in December 2024.” 

The government of Katsina State, driven by similar motivations, plans to organise a mass marriage scheme for 1,000 couples. In 2025, the Governor of Kebbi and his wife, through the Nafisa Nasir Charity Development Foundation (NANAS), organised the same for over 300 couples. While the numbers listed so far are staggering, they are merely a fraction of the true scale of this phenomenon. This picture does not even factor in the fiscal cost to the state. In the Kebbi State mass marriage scheme, the government paid N54m for dowry alone. In 2025, the Kano state government set aside N2.5b for state-sponsored weddings alone. While the total fiscal outlay for the recent marriage scheme in Zamfara has yet to be disclosed, at least ₦25 million has already been committed—₦200,000 paid as dowry for each bride and an additional ₦50,000 provided to support small-scale businesses in the couples’ homes. 

To begin with, welfare support and intervention are indeed the obligations of the state. A government is, by law and in principle, expected to enact policies and pursue interventions that tangibly improve the lives of its citizens. Going by Section 14(2) of the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy, “the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government”  In addition to the protection of lives and properties, all public actions and governmental policies must be geared towards improving living standards. Thus, while the premise of the government on which the mass marriage schemes are predicated is correct and well in line with the state’s duty, there are questions to be asked about the mass marriage schemes themselves, particularly for the northern region, and in a country like Nigeria. 

In a region like northern Nigeria, marked by entrenched poverty, low educational attainment, and limited economic opportunities, what priority should mass marriage schemes command in efforts to improve welfare and living standards? How suitable are they as a policy response to these conditions? 

A 2022 study by the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) found that about 65% of all poor people in Nigeria live in the north, and in specific states like Sokoto, the rate of multidimensional poverty is up to 91%. It is a very elementary knowledge that mass-marriage schemes are neither welfare strategies nor meaningful tools for poverty alleviation. Mass education has always been that tool. In the 1950s, in the aftermath of the Korean War, South Korea was one of the world’s poorest nations. To turn around the country’s ailing fortune, the government embarked on an aggressive education campaign. The impact of this was the creation of a skilled workforce within a short time, and with further industrial policies, South Korea became an industrial powerhouse. 

Kerala in India presents another credible instance of transformation through precise social investment. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Kerala was among the poorest regions in India, with an average income roughly one-third lower than the national average. Beginning in the late 1950s, Kerala pursued sustained social investment policies that transformed it into one of India’s more prosperous states. There was a strong emphasis on mass literacy and education as a driver of social development, for reducing mortality rates and delaying the age of marriage among girls, as noted in a study. Successive governments also instituted health reforms and land redistribution, which provided security for the poor and helped them invest in education. 

Several other states have demonstrated what social development strategies can be used to improve socioeconomic welfare. Chief amongst these are education and mass literacy campaigns, health reformation, women’s empowerment, rural development, and housing development policies. Northern Nigeria is bedevilled by a hydra-headed monster. Despite years of concern, northern states continue to account for the largest share of out-of-school children in Nigeria, with Kano, Katsina, and Jigawa holding 16% of Nigeria’s 10.2 million out-of-school children (as of 2025, according to UNICEF). Similarly, mortality rates are significantly higher in northern Nigeria than in other parts of the country. Unsurprisingly, the region continues to bear the heaviest burden of poverty in Nigeria, with deprivation deeply entrenched in a region where resources are desperately few and far between.

It is a matter of plain fact, given the above, that the mass-marriage schemes merely deepen the existential socioeconomic crises. It simply leads to higher birth rates within a region where maternal and child mortality are alarming. In straightforward terms, the mass marriage schemes of the north are cases of policy misalignment devoid of socioeconomic development. At best—indeed, at its most charitable reading—the schemes amount to insincere attempts by the government to sidestep the responsibility of implementing sustainable development policies. More alarming is the fact that this practice risks perpetuating the problem of early (female) child marriage deeper, in a region with high rates of child marriage.

For the North to achieve meaningful socioeconomic and welfare development, the political and traditional elite must commit to implementing targeted, evidence-based strategies, including mass literacy campaigns, healthcare reform, effective responses to insecurity, and the establishment of sound and reliable economic policies. Several infrastructural facilities in the north that used to be pillars of economic incentives have fallen apart as a result of administrative neglect and the worsening insecurity crises. These are places calling for administrative investments. The leaders of the North must pay attention to salient policies that promise progress and development. Without these, northern Nigeria will only continue to founder in the torrent of chronic underdevelopment.