Extract from a message to opening plenary of the 2001 conference by Mrs Graça Machel
....My continent Africa has many widows, of all ages, in all conditions and degrees of poverty, isolation and need. In my own country Mozambique, the civil war left a legacy of hundreds and thousands of widows and fatherless children. The HIV/AIDS pandemic has devastated family life across the continent leaving uncountable numbers of orphans and placing an additional burden on older women, many of them widows, who have to take on the care of sick and dying children and grandchildren in need.
These brave and resilient women symbolise a situation which cuts across culture, religion and nationality.
CEDAW Article 15: Equality Before the Law and in Civil Matters
1. States Parties shall accord to women equality with men before the law.
2. States Parties shall accord to women, in civil matters, a legal capacity identical to that of men and the same opportunities to exercise that capacity. They shall in particular give women equal rights to conclude contracts and to administer property and treat them equally in all stages of procedure in courts and tribunals.
3. States P{arties agree that all contracts and all other private instruments of any kind with a legal effect which is directed at restricting the legal capacity of women shall be deemed null and void
4. States Parties shall accord to men and women the same rights with regard to the law relating to the movement of persons and the freedom to choose their residence and domicile.
Questions
1. Are women formally treated equally with men under the law with respect to their legal capacity to conclude contracts and administer property.? . . .
3. Do women have the same rights men as to administer property? Can women be executors or administrators of estates?
4. Do women have the right to administer property without interference or consent by a male, regardless of whether they acquire it during marriage, bring it into marriage or are unmarried? If not, why not?
9. Has any research been carried out regarding judicial reasoning and judicial practices that have a differential impact on women and men?
11. Are women and men accorded the same legal rights of freedom of movement and choice of residence? Do women have the right to choose the place where they live? Do traditions or customs restrict women from exercising this right?