How does a house become a family house? When the original owner dies! But more so, a house takes on the family house posture when the descendants of the original owner take over ownership. Family houses are complex entities. The complexities escalate when most of the descendants had not done much with their lives and all they have to hold on to is the one house built by their forebear. When that is the reality, instead of the house uniting the family, it can potentially divide the descendants.
The situation of family houses touch on the fabric of our society. Does the weakening of the inter-locking threads of the family fabric hold deep implications for our culture and nationhood? I guess so! How can such issues be addressed? I do not know!
TRACING THE FAMILY TREE
Here is a set-up of an imaginary three generations of one family. About 90 years ago, Kwabena Manu married Adjeley. They built a house, where they raised their six children. Between them, the six children gave birth to a total of 22 children. The multiplier effect set in as the 22 grandchildren extended the family further. Currently, there are about 70 descendants in this complex external family.
As the family had become extended and multiplied over the three generations, the family house has become too small for the descendants. Who owns the family house? Currently, about a dozen family members live in the house. In the olden days, several homes were a collection of single rooms, or for luxury, “chamber and halls”. They had out-houses for baths and latrines.
Owing to the complexities of family houses, increasingly, there are people who cannot go home again—when home is defined as where you trace your roots to. When the family home is compromised, your home and for some, your hometown becomes wherever you live.
SHARING THE FAMILY HOUSE
How do you share a chamber-and-hall across generations? It is a tricky matter, which if not handled well, someone might be murdered along the way. Imagine the following real-life scenario. When the original owner of a house died 38 years ago, the five chamber-and-hall housing unit was divided among his eight children. He had children with five women so each woman’s children inherited one set of chamber-and-hall. On the surface, it was an equitable sharing. But soon, the complexities erupted.
The firstborn children took over the chamber-and-hall units, claiming them as their own—exclusively. One set of siblings (three brothers) are now at each other’s throats. The firstborn had rented out the chamber-and-hall and been collecting rent for the past 26 years. He does not make accounts to the two brothers.
One of the brothers is vehemently demanding for the right thing to be done, and for proper equity and transparency to prevail. The senior brother is refusing. His reason? He is the oldest therefore has the ultimate right. Without transparency and accountability, a coup d’état is brewing and could explode any day. If the coup erupts, it will be an ugly explosion. Question: After the present generation has died off, who will claim ownership of this chamber-and-hall? This situation has too much potential to weaken this particular extended family unit.
WHO MAINTAINS THE OLD HOMESTEADS
A family house belongs to all, yet does not belong to anyone in particular. So who is responsible for maintaining the house? Easily, some family houses become dilapidated with no one to repair them. Whenever I go on road trips to various parts of the country, I stare at ramshackle houses with rusty leaning roofs and broken walls. These houses give most hometowns a depressing look. No wonder some people never return to their hometowns after they migrate to a city!
In some houses, even post-paid electricity bills present ripe opportunities for conflict among relatives. Some relatives behave as if they expect their great grandparents to come from the far-beyond to pay their electricity bills! When something breaks down in the house, no one wants to fix it. A simple matter of sharing the cost becomes a quarrelsome matter that can create a wedge between relatives.
In one house I know of, the roof exhibited signs of rottenness over a decade. The family head set an annual levy for adults to pay to fund the renovation of the house. For five years, the total money collected was meagre. Meanwhile, rain water continued to pour in through the rotten roof. It became apparent that the house might cave in. Replacing the roof became an emergency.
One family member decided to rescue the house. Using her own money, she had the roof replaced, and other repair work done. Interestingly, since the house was renovated, some family members who had not showed duty of care for the old homestead had surfaced to explain the ownership system of the family house. They are arguing that the family house belongs exclusively to the paternal descendants. Interestingly, the woman who alone paid for the entire cost of renovating the family house traces her ancestry through her mother. In effect, she had been defined out of the family house she fixed!
FAMILY HOUSES FOR SALE AND RENT
Some cunning cheating elders of families have gone to the extent of selling old and historic family houses in Accra. They had squandered the money. Family members find out with shock that their family houses suddenly belonged to companies or rich individuals. Some of the old houses had been pulled down and in their place, the new owners have constructed high-rise state-of-the-art structures.
One side of my father’s family has lost access to the ancestral family home. On one very ordinary day, a “by-heart” cousin of mine stormed the house and ordered all relatives to move out within three months to make way for major renovation works. Reluctantly, the old people and relatives moved to perch in neighbouring houses. It was only when the renovation work was completed that the dwellers of the family house realized with shock that the entire house had been rented out. This rendered the family members homeless in their own hometown. In rapid succession, my old aged aunts died off within one year. I can bet that the hurt of homelessness in their old age sent them to their graves.
My cousin justified his action with a grand claim that it was his father who constructed most of the rooms in the family house several yesteryears ago during President Nkrumah’s era, when he held a ministerial position. Strangely, he died about two years after his coup on the family. But still, the family home is occupied by tenants because he took extended rent advance. The family has since dispersed because the old homestead has gone into the hands of tenants. The family connection remains broken!
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