Report - Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights

Impacts – No sense <strong>of</strong> belonging because you have lost your country, identity and roots- cultural outcast;
children lose <strong>the</strong>ir entitlements to land (quantified by costing price <strong>of</strong> land and rental costs incurred
because <strong>of</strong> absence <strong>of</strong> land, loss <strong>of</strong> access to loans); loss <strong>of</strong> security, privacy; children’s development
inhibited. Under <strong>the</strong> Family Law Act women can now claim maintenance and matrimonial property
to cover some <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>se costs.
Action/Intervention –
– Lobby for <strong>the</strong> right to housing and congruent rights including right to employment, right to privacy
and right to education;
– Legislative reform – Employment Relations Bill, Equal Employment Opportunities legislation,
introduce and implement gender sensitised laws and policies;
– Change community attitudes – awareness raising; until we change <strong>the</strong> attitudes we will not be
able to change anything at all;
– Hold <strong>the</strong> colonial rulers accountable for losses and damages sustained by ethnic women;
– Media advocacy;
– Gender analysis <strong>of</strong> government budget;
– Credit schemes and loans for poor women;
– Implement <strong>the</strong> Family Law Act;
– Ratification <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Optional Protocol to CEDAW;
– NGOs to submit parallel reports to treaty bodies and information to UN agencies and <strong>the</strong> Special
Rapporteurs;
– Litigation;
– Partnerships are very important – between all NGOs, stakeholders, civil society, and international
bodies.
182 WOMEN’S RIGHTS TO ADEQUATE HOUSEING AND LAND