Law, Culture and Women's Inheritance Rights in ... - Leitner Center

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(d) prescribe such fees as he may deem fit, and generally make provision for the full implementation of this Law. 17. In this Law, “District” means an area of authority of a District Council established under any enactment of the time being in force; “Registrar” means the Registrar of Marriages appointed by a District Council for the purposes of registering marriages and dissolution of marriages under this Law. 18. On the commencement of this Law the Bye-laws of any District Council relating to the registration of customary marriages and divorces shall on such commencement cease to have effect and shall be deemed to have been cancelled by this Law. 19. This Law shall be deemed to have come into force on the same day as the Intestate Succession Law, 1985 (P.N.D.C.L. 111). [FNa1]. Fellow, Joseph R. Crowley Program in International Human Rights, 2000-2001; Associate, Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP, New York, New York, 2001-present. [FNaa1]. Professor of Law, Fordham Law School; Co-Director, Crowley Program in International Human Rights; J.D. Harvard Law School 1990, B.A. Princeton University 1986. [FN1]. Nii Ashie Kotey & Dzodzi Tsikata, Women and Land Rights in Ghana, in Women and Law in West Africa: Situational Analysis of Some Key Issues Affecting Women 204 (Akua Kuenyehia ed., 1998); Mariama Awumbila, Women and Gender Equality in Ghana: A Situational Analysis, in Gender Training in Ghana: Politics, Issues and Tools 44 (Dzodzi Tsikata ed., 2001) (noting regional variations in women land owners with 50% in the Ashanti region and only two and four percent in the Northern and Upper West regions respectively). [FN2]. C.K. Brown, Gender Roles and Household Allocation of Resources and Decision-Making in Ghana, in The Changing Family in Ghana 21, 25 (Elizabeth Ardayfio-Schandorf ed., 1996) (explaining that women often work on the land but do not control the profits that they make). [FN3]. See Kotey & Tsikata, supra note 1, at 215, 217 (noting that men own most land and that, although women labor on the land, they often do not inherit family land). [FN4]. Sally Baden et al., BRIDGE (development--gender), Background Paper on Gender Issues in Ghana 12 (Jan. 1994). [FN5]. The literacy rate for females in urban areas is 57% and in rural areas 28.3%. See Johanna O. Svanikier, Women's Rights and the Law in Ghana 45 (1997). [FN6]. The literacy rate for males in urban areas is 74.8 % and in rural areas 53.5 %. Id. [FN7]. See The World Bank Group, Africa Region Findings, No. 145, October 1999, at http://www.worldbank.org/afr/findings/english/find145.htm. [FN8]. U.S. Dep't of State, 1999 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices: Ghana, Children (2000).
[FN9]. John Hodiak Addai-Sundiata, Family Dynamics and Residential Arrangements in Ghana, in The Changing Family in Ghana 72 (Elizabeth Ardayfio-Schandorf ed., 1996). This number does not reflect the incidence of informal polygynous unions in which married men establish long term relationships, often called concubinages, with other women. [FN10]. Kathy Cusack, Defining Violence, in Violence Against Women and Children in Ghana 29 (Dorcas Coker Appiah & Kathy Cusack eds., 1999). [FN11]. As of 1999, no such shelters existed. Network for Women's Right-- NETRIGHT, Ghana: NGO Alternate Report for Beijing +5, at 16 (Accra, Nov. 1999). A small private shelter opened outside Accra in 1999. E-mail from Chris Dadzie to Tracy Higgins (Jan. 16, 2002). [FN12]. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 999 U.N.T.S. 171 [hereinafter ICCPR]. The Covenant was adopted on December 19, 1966, and entered into force on March 23, 1976. [FN13]. International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 999 U.N.T.S. 3 [hereinafter ICESCR]. The Covenant was adopted on December 19, 1966, and entered into force on January 3, 1976. [FN14]. Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women, G.A. Res. 34/180, 34 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 46) at 193, U.N. Doc. A/34/46 (1980) [hereinafter CEDAW]. The Convention was adopted on December 18, 1979, and entered into force on September 3, 1981. [FN15]. African [Banjul] Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, O.A.U. Doc. CAB/LEG/67/3 Rev.5 (1981), available at www.umn.edu/humanrts/instree/ratz1/afchr.htm [hereinafter African Charter]. The Charter was adopted on June 27, 1981, and entered into force on October 21, 1986. Ghana ratified the Charter on January 24, 1989. [FN16]. Intestate Succession Law, P.N.D.C.L. 111 (1985) (Ghana). [FN17]. See Annex I. [FN18]. U.N. Charter. The Charter was signed on June 26, 1945, and entered into force on October 24, 1945. [FN19]. Universal Declaration of Human Rights, G.A. Res. 217A (III), U.N. Doc. A/180, at 71 (1948). [FN20]. See ICCPR, supra note 12. [FN21]. See ICESCR, supra note 13. [FN22]. U.N. Charter art. 55 states:
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FOR EDUCATIONAL USE ONLY 25 Fordham
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Gloria Ofori-Boadu, Executive Direc
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largely excluded spouses. [FN35] Th
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Nevertheless, despite this relation
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the estate assumed by the customary
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B. Constitutional and Statutory Law
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Page 21 and 22: collect and, because he has no chil
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Page 25 and 26: assistance was only minimal, the pr
Page 27 and 28: Ms. Mercy Dixon, who we met in Kpan
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Page 85 and 86: [FN227]. Interview with Mrs. Ellen
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