Patriarchy and the women's right to own land in Anambra State, Nigeria: a human rights-based approach

This paper presents an analysis of patriarchal cultural practices and women’s rights to land in Anambra State, Nigeria, using the human rights-based approach (HRBA). The study explores the diverse barriers women encounter in their quest to own and inherit land, spotlighting the nexus between cultural practices, legal frameworks, and human rights as contained in international instruments. In Anambra State, a region inundated with patriarchal cultural practices, women’s rights to ownership of land are frequently litigated in divorce and inheritance proceedings. This paper takes a review of the patriarchal practices and legal impediments that facilitate gender gaps in land rights in Anambra State, Nigeria. It critically analyses cases where women’s rights to land are most usually challenged, for instance, disputes relating to inheritance as well as dissolution of marriages, mainstreaming the divergence between statutes and their actual implementation. The study found that both are prevalent patriarchal cultural practices in Anambra States that favour men as against women’s right to own landed property. The paper also dealt with the broader effect of these findings as it relates to international human rights best practices, particularly the Maputo Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights and the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). It further found that the domestic laws and judicial interventions did not clearly address discriminatory cultural practices as envisioned in international instruments. This paper provides a critical analysis of the intricacies infringing women’s land rights in a patriarchal society, providing understandings of how legislative and judicial interventions can impact women's right to own land in Anambra State, Nigeria. Therefore, there is an influence of patriarchal cultural practices on women’s rights to land ownership in Anambra State, and within the broader context of municipal and international human rights laws in Nigeria, the practices are still prevalent as there are cases challenging the patriarchal practices from Anambra State in Nigerian courts.