The Lagos megachurch pastor is challenging both gender camps — and the internet has opinions.

Nigerian relationship pastor Kingsley Okonkwo has detonated a social media firestorm — and this time, he's coming for the men too.

The lead pastor of David's Christian Centre and one of Nigeria's most-followed relationship voices took to X on Sunday, March 15, firing off a pointed challenge: men have become so accustomed to financially dependent partners that marriage itself now feels like a trap.

"Men, it's high time we start having standards," he wrote. “You're too used to women that are liabilities — that's why less and less men desire marriage. They see it as a burden.”

His prescription was blunt: refuse to marry broke women. Demand a partner, not a dependent. "Maybe it will make more women work and not see marriage and dating as a poverty alleviation scheme," he added.

But Okonkwo didn't let men off the hook either — and that's what made this go nuclear.

He called out men who deliberately target financially vulnerable women to feed their egos and maintain control. "It's doing more harm than good," he warned. “All humans have value and abilities — let them develop it.”

His core argument: society normalises women demanding wealthy husbands while men are shamed for expecting any financial contribution in return. He called the double standard "unbiblical" and "damaging" — and said it's quietly killing the institution of marriage.

The posts were rapidly amplified, exploding into the kind of multi-front debate Nigerian social media does best. Supporters cheered him for demanding mutual accountability. Critics fired back, accusing him of monetising matrimony and erasing the economic value of homemaking, child-rearing, and emotional labour — contributions that rarely appear in a bank statement but hold households together.

The real nerve Okonkwo struck? In an era of rising living costs, stagnant wages, and shifting gender expectations, the question of who pays for what in a marriage has never been more combustible — or more unresolved.