Am I a bad woman?

Dear BMW
I have been married to my husband for 15 years and we have three children.
My husband had been having an affair with another woman for years now, he has a child with the woman. My problem is that all this time he has been lying to me until the last few months of 2015 when he told me that he had actually married the woman in 2012.
Now my husband and I were married in 2001 in a religious ceremony, but again in 2002 we registered our marriage at the DCs in Lilongwe.
When my husband told me that he had actually married this other woman, I looked at the Marriage Act and learned that polygamy is prohibited in a civil marriage. I told my husband, but he has challenged me, saying that these laws are just academic, meaning they do not work.
I have considered divorcing him, but on second thought I changed my mind, I am going to court with a bigamy case against him.
Someone related to him says a lawyer told him a wife cannot take her husband to court for such an issue it will be construed that the woman is bad but I feel I will only be doing the right thing.
I believe that the laws are put in place to protect people.
BMW, do you think I am a bad woman because I am going to court?
CK, Lilongwe

CK,
I had started on a tirade/rant stating how innocent, gullible and blinded by illusion you are. But something in my conscience (yes, conscience), tells me that you are genuinely troubled and I need not rub it is in.
There are two types of women: those in love and those that are plain stupid.
I am finding it hard to determine where you stand.
So, instead I’ll just tell you a little story. Way back when I was in college somewhere close to a village called Chirunga in Zomba, one of my earlier mentors was a man called Edge Kanyongolo. Back then, he was a little handsomer with a forest of thick, black hair on his head.
Me and a group of friends had published an ‘illegal’ student newsletter and got into trouble with the administration, upon which we were summoned to appear before an impromptu ad hoc committee.
So, I rushed off to meet the famed ‘law professor’. But after I, through gasps of despair and desperation, had explained the story to him, he simply pulled a book from his shelf and passed it on to me. The title of the book was the The Law is an Ass.
I can hardly recall the gist of the book as I read it over 20 years ago and I can hardly get another copy to refresh my memory (in retrospect, I should have stolen Edge’s copy).
But the long and short of it is that if it is against the law, then the law is an ass. Or, if the legal system or a particular law is wrong or not good enough, it should be changed.
Now, what I am really saying is this: the law is just a framework within which your marriage exists. The law will not solve the problems inherent in your marriage.
If your man went out of your matrimonial home to wed another woman, the problem is not the law, the problem is your husband. Deal with him.
Besides, if your husband walked out on your to marry another woman, there should have been a series of events that led to that ultimate action.
The fact that you let it culminate in him marrying another woman shows that there is something inherently wrong with you.
Do I think that you are a bad woman because you’re going to court? He’ll yes.
Make up your mind on whether you’re leaving that man or not.
You know, by taking our petty marital issues to the courts, the impression we give as a nation is that our judges and magistrates are a bunch of lazy men and women with too much time on their hands.
I know that your odds are pretty much limited as you are weighing the options of life after that man. But that is your person decision and not mine to make on your behalf.
Leave that man or chase him out of that house. It’s that simple. Leave the courts and the horrible (oops, sorry. That should read honourable) men of the bar alone.
The ultimatum is that simple. Basi. Palibe nkhani apa.
Have a blessed Sunday.