• 19
  • August
    2011

The death of a loved one, especially a spouse, is devastating. Imagine after just having begun to mourn for your lost husband, his relatives invade your home and take your property, including money, credit cards, clothing and family keepsakes. That is exactly what happened to a newly widowed woman living in Tanzania. Her relatives constructively disinherited her.

The woman's husband succumbed to malaria and died shortly after being hospitalized. The couple has four children ranging from two months old to ten years old. When the widow came home from the hospital, she had been locked out of her own bedroom. A few days later, the in-laws returned with suitcases and started taking the widow's property.

At the time of her husband's death, the widow was still pregnant with their youngest child. She went into labor before her husband's body was laid to rest. After the burial of her husband, she attempted to return home to put things in order for her family. Her in-laws refused to let her take her two oldest children with her. Instead, they insisted they would find schools for the children.

When she got home, without more than half her family unit, she was shocked once more to find that her brother-in-law was attempting to shut her out of the house, which she and her husband had been building before his death. She forced her way in to the home and has since refused to leave it. He brother-in-law became physically violent with her, at one point forcing her to call police.

The widow sought help at the Legal and Human Rights Centre (LHRC) in Dar es Salaam to regain her children and stolen property. A legal officer at the LHRC explained, however, that the probate and inheritance laws in Tanzania do not favor widows at all. Under custom and law, women are allowed only to inherit through their children. If a woman was barren, she would be left with nothing.

Inheritance and probate laws are meant to protect those who are left behind. The laws in Tanzania seem to only punish wives and mothers and leave them destitute in the wake their husbands' passing.

Source: IPP Media, "How widows are deprived through outdated, unfair inheritance laws," Rose Mwalongo, Aug. 19, 2011