An analysis of the legal framework on gender discrimination and women’s rights to property in Nigeria: a case study of the Igala people

Abstract

Although Nigeria is a signatory to several international, regional, and homegrown legal instruments seeking to promote the rights of women, like; the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women, the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, and supported fundamentally by the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999, which disallows female gender discrimination and also allows women the right to own immovable property. Evidence, however, abounds in most Nigerian communities and ethnic groupings of the flagrant disregard and abuse of the rights of women, especially in reference to property ownership and inheritance during and after marriage. Since the practices that deepen these manifestations of discrimination are supported by age-long traditional beliefs and customs, it seems to thrive without regard to the position of conventions and laws as those aforementioned. It is believed that the patriarchal nature of the Igala (a minority ethnic group, living in Kogi State, North – Central Nigeria and the focal point of this research) provides an enabling environment for women’s exclusion regarding property ownership and inheritance, with culture being used as a tool to justify violations.