The nationwide wedding drought and future of the Nigerian family

By Razak Owolabi

One of the male beneficiaries of the 2023 mass wedding of 1,800 couples sponsored by the Kano State government who is in his forties had this to say about why he was just getting married:

“Life is really tough, this is why I could not get married until now, though I wanted to. I pray my marriage becomes the key to my prosperity”.

This statement sums up the hardship being faced at present by Nigeria’s eligible males and females which constitutes stumbling blocks on the sacred path to marriage. It also highlights the spiritual side of the marriage ritual with the common belief that marriage opens the road to future prosperity and better life.

From the statement and the event that led to it, one could also sense the present epidemic of decreasing number of weddings, the precursor to the marriage institution,  in the country.

The way the wedding drought is ravaging the foundation of the Nigerian family, it is becoming apparent that only a declaration of state of emergency on marriage may bring succour to the millions of eligible youths who are postponing or abandoning the globally approved rite of passage, meant for the extension and sustainance of the human race, among others.

If proper corrective  steps are not taken by capable stakeholders, we may be witnessing the gradual extinction of the Nigerian family and lineage. This is because as marriages decline, population depletion is likely to follow as most couples prefer to raise their offsprings in a standard and society sanctioned family settings rather than out of wedlock.

While weddings are affairs lasting hours or days, marriages are life time ventures that last years. But weddings are legal, religious, cultural and societal requirements demanded before one could embark on the life long journey of marriage. A marriage without a wedding ceremony is thus condemned in most societies.

Kudos to state governments like Kano, and Zamfara in Nigeria who have woken up to, and identified the national wedding emergency for some years now, and have been sponsoring weddings for indigents of their states.

Sponsored mass weddings are not new or limited to Nigeria, cases abound in the Middle East especially among Arab countries where governments take it as social responsibility to support couples due to the very high financial resources and stress involved if individual love birds are left to do it alone.

Mass weddings are also another way through which families and religious institutions in parts of Nigeria with large population of overdue spinsters and bachelors cut down huge cost and save funds and time. This means a collective single rite will be performed for all the couples in a fell swoop.

The 2023 mass wedding mentioned earlier, was estimated to have cost the Kano government $1 million. Apart from this, the state government paid about  N50,000 as dowry on behalf of each groom to his bride. The couples were also given food, beddings, bed, and clothes.

The 2023 event was dubbed as the largest mass wedding in Nigeria with each couple given additional N20,000. The mass wedding took place at  44 centers in the 44 local government areas of the state.

For the present year, 2026, arrangements by the same  government of Kano State are ongoing for another sponsored mass wedding for 1,500 lovers, under its marriage social welfare initiative called ‘Auren Gata’.

According to the government, successes recorded in previous arrangements encouraged the present adminstration to sustain the momentum.

On its own part, the Zamfara State government has sponsored the mass wedding of over 100 couples drawn from vulnerable groups across 14 local government areas so far in 2026.

The government provided dowry payments of N200,000 for each groom apart from the fact that   each bride received N50,000 to support small-scale commercial activities in their matrimonial homes.

Earlier in 2025, the Zamfara State Government through its Zakat and Endowment Board also sponsored the mass wedding of 200 female orphans, widows and other less privileged women in the state as part of its 2025 social intervention programme.

But for these two state governments, most of these love birds would have been single for life. The cost of marriages in Nigeria now is strangulating especially with the economic hardship plaguing most families. Getting food on the table is the number one priority of most Nigerians, before they even think of marriage these days.

In many parts of the country, it is also common for parents to take huge loans to sponsor the weddings of their children, loans they may still be paying back years after the ceremony.

Young lovers also seek out sponsors for such ceremonies if their parents are financially incapacitated.

Events and wedding planners have cashed in on the trend to fill the gap by offering their services to couples who want to impress the world with a “talk-of-the-town” wedding, costing millions of Naira to plan alone.

Presently, there is a huge shift in how the youth view domesticity compared to the past, as the Nigerian marriage landscape is undergoing a radical transformation with the goal posts getting wider daily.

For decades, marriage was considered an inevitable milestone for every Nigerian adult. But recent data suggests a cooling of this fervour. According to recent demographic projections, the percentage of “currently married” individuals in Nigeria has seen a gentle but relentless decline.

Statistics for the year 2024 show that the rate of married couples among those eligible, was approximately 66.06 percent.  By 2025, it went down to 65.73 percent and by early 2026, it was estimated to be around 65.4 percent.

While some observers may conclude that a 0.6 percent

drop over two years is a negligible figure, however when one looks at the country’s estimated population of over 230 million, this negligible amount represents millions of young Nigerians choosing to delay heading to, or doing away with the altar.

Marriage has been perceived for ages as a lifetime commitment but lovers are no longer excited to go into the “for better for worse” collaboration. The declining numbers of visitors to the marriage registry all over the country is a testimony. The youths now break up after falling in love within record times. Relationships are no more long lasting therefore arresting development or progression into marriage which is the ultimate goal.

The economic and social realities on the ground have been preventing love birds from going farther than the “romance” stage. Internet – influenced moral decadence among the youth is another factor, though of less latitude than financial incapacity. A huge number of the youths are more interested in sexual relationship than marriage relationship because of high cost of weddings. In some cases, in some parts of the country, after getting the lady pregnant, the love birds would move in and start living together as “husband and wife” with little or no ceremony.

This “Wedding Inflation” crisis is among the reasons for the loss of interest in tying the nuptial knot. People still fall in love but plunging into marriage seems to be scary to most.

Current realities show that in 2026, the financial bar has been raised to a new high for wedding ceremonies with the cost of a “standard” middle-class Nigerian wedding now ranging between N5 million and N15 million. Some could be higher. How many Nigerian bachelors could afford this especially with the current economic realities?

Coupled with unprecedented food inflation and prices of petrol affecting every other thing in the country, couples are finding that the cost of a single day’s celebration, that is wedding, could serve as a startup fund for a business or deposit for their fully owned personal apartment, depending on the state of the country they plan to settle down.

An increasing population of  youths are placing more priority on development of their careers thus relegating marriage to a lower rung of the ladder. In a recent study, 58 percent of men surveyed, mentioned lack of funds as the major reason for not getting married yet.

With respect to urbanization and education, it is also observed that as more Nigerian women pursue post-graduate degrees and corporate leadership;

subsequently the average age of first marriage is creeping upward, moving away from the early 20s toward the late 20s, early 30s and even late 30s.

Speaking of solutions to the wedding drought, some experts have suggested what is known as, “Financial Realism” whereby couples would  “marry smart”. One way this is done, is by reducing the huge number of invited wedding guests to just a few individuals, to cut cost.

There are also calls for relationship literacy through pre-marital education or counseling during which couples will be educated on how to navigate the financial stress of the modern economy and to plan realistically.

The Federal Government could also intervene through marriage friendly national policies like subsidising the cost of marriage and sponsoring mass weddings like Kano and Zamfara States have been doing.

Some observers have however argued that the problem at hand is just temporary saying that at the end of the day the marriage institution will come out stronger, lasting and qualitative if the solutions mentioned are implemented.

Nonetheless, a salient question one should ask is: Is qualitative marriage the solution to the daily increasing population of poverty stricken eligible youths who are yearning to become husbands and wives but have no means of livelihood through no fault of theirs?

This has made some analysts to assert that  the real “wedding” for most couples begins after  the last guest from the ceremony has left and only the husband and wife remain, and the battle for survival begins.

The couple will then be faced with the big question: How do we manage or multiply what you have brought to the table?