THE internet is alive with news that 112-year-old Ahmed Muhamed Dore has married Safia Abdulleh, age 17, in the Galguduud region of Somalia. Says Dore:
“Today God helped me realise my dream… I didn’t force her, but used my experience to convince her of my love, and then we agreed to marry.”
It’s a cracking story, and one backed up by no proof of wither parties ages, nor of their wedding. There exists no Jeremy Kyle equivalent in Somalia for us to watch the happy couple on the telly. No DNA test can prove the man’s age.
All we get is the story delivered as fact. And we get this gem from the Mail:
Somali adolescent girls are often married off to older men, but it is rare for a man as old as Dhore to marry a girl of Abdulle’s age.
Rare for a man of 112 to marry a teenager. How’s that for insight? Rare for a man to be 112 and find a need of a wife.
The BBC’s Mohamed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu says the marriage in the town of Guriceel is being described by Somalian historians as the first of its kind in the Horn of Africa nation for over a century.
There have been a few 109 year olds and a 105 year old who married a toddler but not a single 112-year–old has married a 17-year-old since Samira Mirza married her toyboy in 1894.
This is kind of sensational, uncorroborated news that the internet loves. One person reports it. Everyone repeats it. It becomes a fact. If you see a source for the story, do tell…
Compared to Methuselah, he probably seemed a good catch. Hundreds of people have attended the wedding of Ahmed Muhamed Dore, who says he is 112, and his bride, aged 17. At the ceremony in central Somalia, Mr Dore - who already has 18 children by five wives - said he would like to have more with his new wife, Safia Abdulleh.
'Today God helped me realise my dream,' he said, after the wedding in the region of Galguduud.
The bride's family said she was 'happy with her new husband'.
Mr Dore said he and his bride - who is young enough to be his great-great-grand-daughter - were from the same village in Somalia and that he had waited for her to grow up to propose.
The marriage in the town of Guriceel is being described by Somalian historians as the first of its kind in the Horn of Africa nation for over a century.
'I didn't force her, but used my experience to convince her of my love; and then we agreed to marry,' Mr Dore was quoted by the BBC as saying.
He said his children and two other wives agreed to the marriage, as did Abdulle's parents.The pair celebrated their marriage late Tuesday in central Somalia before hundreds of guests. Somali adolescent girls are often married off to older men, but it is rare for a man as old as Dhore to marry a girl of Abdulle's age.
Dhore claims to be 112, but there is no way to verify the claim.This marriage was his 6th; three of Dhore's wives have died.
Polygamy is widely practiced in predominantly
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