- We have a supreme law that says “Women and men have the right to equal treatment, including the right to equal opportunities in political, economic, cultural and social spheres.”
- But we have a law allowing the deprivation of women. Let’s face it, most traditional African societies deny women the right to own property.
I was going through the local news websites Monday morning when I came across this interesting story in the Daily Nation ‘Law denying remarried widows right to ex-husband property declared unconstitutional’.
I was shocked. Whoever thought there was a law in our land that takes away a woman’s property for getting remarried. I’m a woman, expecting to be married one day and alive to the reality that that status comes with the likelihood of widowhood.
Growing up I heard many stories of widows and orphans whose property had been grabbed by their husband/father’s relatives. “Mali ya ntoto wetu (Our son’s wealth),” the relatives would say as they carted away moveable property and sometimes kicked the widow and her children out of their house.
As I grew older, I realised stigma against widows was prevalent in our society. It is disturbing that this stigma made it into the laws of the land and was supported by people who should know better—legislators.
I looked up the offending Act and the sections the judge declined to declare as invalid—32 and 33—and I felt sorry for the women of West Pokot, Wajir, Turkana, Garissa, Marsabit, Tana River, Samburu, Lamu, Isiolo, Kajiado, Mandera and Narok.
So on the one hand we have a supreme law that says “Women and men have the right to equal treatment, including the right to equal opportunities in political, economic, cultural and social spheres.” But on the other hand we have a law allowing the deprivation of women. Let’s face it, most traditional African societies deny women the right to own property.
In the year 2022 we have made great strides. We have a woman chief justice and a woman deputy CJ, a third (or so) of the members of the incoming cabinet are women, we have a number of women governors and women legislators, and those of us in corporate organisations are flourishing.
Reading the Nation story and the Act, however, I felt a wave of hopelessness. It got me wondering: if after I marry I were to die interstate, would my widower forfeit the property he inherited from me upon remarriage? The offending Act is silent on that yet women own property nowadays.
In 2010, sixty-seven per cent of Kenyan voters – men and women – voted for the new Constitution, under which we are all equal. Our lawmakers need to remember that.
I’m no law expert, but in my layman's understanding, if we call the 2010 Constitution the supreme law of the land, shouldn’t all other laws then conform to it? That includes traditional laws, most of which frankly should have already been consigned to the dustbin of history.
Female genital mutilation was, and still is, a custom practised by a number of traditional African societies, yet the government has outlawed the practice and is actively fighting it, prosecuting those found practising it. What makes matters succession any different?
The school calendar goes on regardless of what tribe is holding male circumcision at whatever time of the year. What makes succession matters any different?