From Charity Nwakaudu, Abuja
Women in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, have one thing they are commonly in love with: a herbal substance known as ‘kayanmata.’ They testify that it has helped them attract and cage wealthy patrons, who don’t mind spending their last kobo on them.
‘Kayanmata,’ a Hausa word, literary means ‘women’s things’. Elders from the northern part of Nigeria told Daily Sun that it is transferred from mothers to daughters to safeguard their marriage. However, it has been taken over by many young ladies in Abuja who use it as sex enhancer. For them, it is one of the most potent means of holding down wealthy patrons.
It comes in different forms like perfumes, herbal potion and favour oil. They perform different functions like vagina tightening and sweetening. Favour oil performs the special duty of attracting the attention of wealthy men who are ready to spend their last money on the ladies to make sure they keep sleeping with them.
Urenma, from Maitama claimed that using “kayanmata” has changed her life. She said, prior to coming face-to-face with the wonder substance, she had difficulty holding down rich men. But since she was introduced to it, everything has fallen into place: “Beauty is not enough to get men’s attention these days. No matter your looks, ‘kayanmata’ will help you get what you want by attracting wealthy patrons and make them fully committed to the business.
“Things were very tough for me before a friend introduced me to it. Initially I was scared but when I tested the vagina tightening and sweetening and saw the efficacy, I became addicted to it.
“Though the products are very expensive ranging from N20,000, depending on what you want, it is now part of my life because it brings wealthy patrons to me and once I keep to the rules of the substance, they do as I say.”
Loveth, from Wuse 2, also confessed: “I am now a landlady here in Abuja and living large. My man cannot do without me. But because I don’t want to marry him, why I have not gone for the one that will make him to divorce his wife.
“It has different types, but the one I use is the body sweetener, that makes any man that sleeps with me to want to do more. The man cannot help it but to keep thinking and feeling to have me always. No other woman can look like a woman to him. So, he does anything I tell him.
“There are some that can make the man to divorce his wife and marry you but I don’t use it because I don’t want to harm any woman. I just want the money and the fun attached to it.”
It is not only sex workers that are in love with ‘kayanmata’, some housewives give thumbs up to it. One of them, Joy, from Maitama, told Daily Sun that she is enamoured with it.
Even her friends believe it is effective. But she does not use it because she is scared and believes there must be after effects: “The ‘kayanmata’ of a thing is now the order of the day. It is difficult to see any lady that is not using it. They said it is effective and expensive. I am not afraid of the cost but the side effects. I don’t want what I will use today and tomorrow, I will start regretting.”
Another housewife from Nyanya, Salamatu, said, if not for ‘kayanmata,’ she would have been sent out of her matrimonial home by now. She said her in-laws conspired and married a beautiful young lady for her husband but with ‘kayanmata’ she is still on top of the game: “They married the girl and brought her home without telling me. The first six months was hell, I was nearly thrown out before a neighbour introduced me to it. Now, I am on top of the game, after applying my perfume and favour oil; it is what I approve that happens in the house. Instead of becoming a co-wife, she is now just like a maid.”
For Florence, who resides in Kuje, her marriage would have been a mess but for ‘kayanmata’:
“Before now my husband was always keeping late nights, he did not care for the family, but since I started using ‘kayanmata’, ah! I am now treated like a queen. The man is always at home. He doesn’t allow me to lack anything that he can provide. ‘Kayanmata’ is wonderful.”
A ‘kayanmata’ seller at Airport Road, Sani, said the product is not fetish as most people think. It is just a mixture of herbs to improve and make sex life of partners interesting.
He explained that ‘kayan mata’ literally means ‘women’s things’ in Hausa, that the product is a sex and love enhancer originally meant to bond couples, as it possesses the power to improve their affections.
But the product has been misconstrued and abused by women who are in desperate need of men or cash.
“It has different types, some force men to give their partners whatever they want or even divorce their wives for them. But it doesn’t kill or harm the man, it only makes him to live according to the expectations of the lady,” he said.
Another dealer in Kubwa, Madam Sharp-Sharp, said: “The product just makes your sex organs extremely very sweet, so sweet that when your man tastes another woman, the woman would taste soar to your man.
“When you use the product and sleep with your man, he can never get good sensation from another woman, except you, and that will make him keep coming for you.
‘Kayanmata’ is of different types. She identified one as ‘ATM’, which has the capacity of compelling men to release cash and property on the command of the user.
A clergyman who did not want his name in the print agreed that ‘kayanmata’ is now the order of the day: “I have been advising women to be careful not to destroy their lives and homes in the name of safeguarding their marriages.”
Meanwhile, some residents of Abuja have attributed the high rate of divorce in the FCT to the rampant use of ‘kayanmata’. They said, in the quest to get married or make fast money, most single ladies and even married women have uncovered a ‘fetish’ means of snatching people’s husbands.
The desperate women have gone deep in search of the solution to their problems by using this aphrodisiac to hypnotise and bind men to themselves and, once they stop using the substance or it expires, the man sees them as different women altogether, which mostly leads to divorce.
Friday, a resident of Mpape, said there was no need keeping a woman different from who you married: “I know that marriage is not all about sex, but it is very important in every relationship. If you have made me to marry you, leaving my real love, be ready to be using it to the end because, any day I stop getting that sweet sensation, that’s the end. That is why marriages are collapsing every day, because most people are under the influence of this, instead of true love.”