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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The Erosion of Women's Rights and the Political Economy of Customary Law in Zimbabwe |
Author: | Peters, Beverly |
Year: | 2000 |
Periodical: | South African Journal of International Affairs |
Volume: | 7 |
Issue: | 1 |
Period: | Summer |
Pages: | 123-129 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Zimbabwe |
Subjects: | conflict of laws women law Law, Human Rights and Violence Women's Issues Politics and Government Economics and Trade Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Law, Legal Issues, and Human Rights Cultural Roles economics |
External link: | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10220460009545293 |
Abstract: | Women play a crucial role in the maintenance of the household in Zimbabwe. They are the chief producers of agricultural foodstuffs. However, recent events seem to deny women's historical role in the war of liberation and their crucial roles in agricultural production and unpaid work in the household. In the case of Magaya versus Magaya, the Zimbabwe Supreme Court based its judgment on customary law that dispossesses women of inherited property and returns them to minority status. This paper presents the Magaya versus Magaya ruling (April 1999) as a case illustrating the continuation of a dual system of law which legislates inequality between men and women. It also gives attention to a series of laws enacted after independence intended to guarantee women certain rights, in particular the Legal Age of Majority Act (LAMA), and sketches the limits of these reforms, in particular Article 23 of the Zimbabwe Bill of Rights, which allows for discrimination against women, if it is 'in the nature of African society' to do so. The recent ruling of the Supreme Court in the Magaya case signals that women's rights under general law are tenuous at best. This ruling threatens the right of women to own and hold property, in particular land, and solidifies the control that men exert over society. Such a judgment must be seen within the context of the current political economy of Zimbabwe. Ref. |