By
Moses Talemwa
WEEKLY OBSERVER
If you haven’t heard the radio advertisement calling
for people to forget about the hassle of calling friends,
who won’t turn up for the never ending wedding meetings,
and simply deal with a bank to finance, you are far behind
news.
People are walking into banks to borrow money so that they
can get married. It looks like marriage is no longer a major
risk to the banking community.
This is how it works; Jane and Peter decide to marry. They
then proceed to the bank and ask for a two in one loan,
which allows the salaried couple to contribute jointly in
repaying the loan once their wedding is done.
According to Bank of Africa Customer Care Officer, Vincent
Nyangweso, the offer is open to salaried employees, who
agree to have their salaries channelled to a joint account,
where deductions are made accordingly.
He explains that a couple earning a joint monthly salary
of 800,000 can access up to 10million shillings in loan,
payable in 48months or 4years.
According to Nyangweso, the Bank will not ask for the wedding
budget but will leave it to the couple to determine how
much they need and offer it accordingly.
Probably the banks know how to go about it, but people have
been known to call wedding meetings, raise money and never
wed at all.
I remember a chap called Julius from Bweyogerere who invited
us to his wedding meetings in 2004, then after raising enough
funds for the ceremony or so we thought, he decided against
it, escaping instead to the UK to do kyeyo.
So the cautious me asks the bank, what happens if the couple
fails to own up, or decides against the wedding after securing
the loan?
Another Banking Assistant says those are rare cases, most
people will actually own up. To the banks, a couple is more
conscious of their reputation than a singleton, and as such
will seek to repay a bank loan as soon as possible.
But would you seek a loan to finance for your wedding anyway?
Yes, say the optimists. You see for a long time it has
been fashionable to seek a salary loan to acquire all manner
of things from that flashy Japanese car, to household items
and even office accessories. Most of these items for which
we seek financial support to acquire are likely to stay
for only so long. What about that marriage which could turn
out to be more durable? They add that the added benefit
of being in a marriage is that one’s welfare will
improve immeasurably so the small pain of paying back a
loan is virtually negligible.
The optimists also argue that managing a loan as a couple
is the surest test that a marriage will survive given the
discipline needed to pull off the feat. They add that many
a marriage has failed because the couple has failed to handle
their finances in a transparent manner, but with such a
loan, there are no shortcuts. You have to make it.
Well as expected the pessimists are not persuaded. They
intimate that a marriage is complicated enough without having
to start with a debt, so it is only plausible that it should
start with as few expectations as possible. They argue that
to borrow money to hold a wedding would be to exert unfair
expectations on the couple which might in turn put a strain
on the relationship, if the dreams are not fully met initially.
But optimists add that if one can take a loan in order
to take your children to school what should it be so strange
when it comes to getting married?
For instance wedding meetings are actually running out
of steam, so the time is right to move on. Most people I
have talked to say they dread the meetings, and only attend
if the couple is very close and as such they can’t
afford to miss them. The fact that many people are getting
married means that a person could easily find himself with
9 wedding meetings planned in a month, and how rather than
contribute small amounts of money, avoid them altogether.
This leads to low attendance at meetings, which causes many
couples to fail to realize their expectations in time.
In addition, whereas small simple weddings are the ideal
for most couples, family and friends’ expectations
soon take advantage over and commercialized weddings are
the answer.
For instance it is no-longer possible to gather one’s
aunts and cousins and arrange them into one committee to
usher in the wedding guests as well as cook and serve the
bridal dinner.
Gone too are the days when the only make-up the bride wore
on her wedding day came from the attention she received
from her aunts after weeks in the bridal room ahead of the
big day. All this is now paid for.
It follows that planning a wedding effectively is stressful
for most couples, due to the sometimes quite high expectations.
However, it is too early to say whether more couples will
be seeking loans to make their lives stress-free in the
interim.
mtalemwa@ugandaobserver.com
|
