Testimony: WIDOWS SPEAK OUT

Widows are finding their voices and are speaking out about the abuse which they face in many countries and regions of the world . They tell tales of brutality and violence, discrimination and humiliations heaped upon them as they face the tragedy of the loss of husbands, income and status.
But their plight is now receiving support from many NGOs, and in particular Empowering Widows in Development (EWD), a rights and advocacy NGO which supports reports and action to end this horrendous abuse of the human rights of millions of women worldwide.
WRI is now receiving information from many widows in Asia and Africa who have asked that their accounts of what happened to them when they were widowed be publicised to support the campaign to draw attention to the plight of widows.

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The case of Teeza Bai

Fourteen years ago, Teeza Bai, living in rural Rajasthan, India was widowed and left about 6 acres of land by her husband. With no children, she went to live with her brother who had lost one of his hands, and attempted to farm the unirrigated land.

The younger brother of her husband claimed the land, and would not allow Teeza access. She went to court and the case has been continuing for over a decade. She has faced threats, and accusations of entering a common-law relationship with another man, which her brother-in-law claimed forfeited her right to ownership of the land.

Last year, the Association of Strong Women Alone stepped in to assist her with the case and helped Teeza to prove that she was living with her brother and that her brother-in-law had forced her out of the house she and her husband had built. As a result, the land papers were issued to her, but this did not stop the harassment that still prevents her from farming the land.

The Association contacted a lawyer in Udaipur who helps poor people with land cases and a session was held to see if some form of mediation could bring an end to this impasse. Some alternative actions have been proposed - but the end result appears to be that she will never be able to earn a livelihood from her land.

It has been suggested that she should sell the land, but because of the dispute she will never receive a fair price., She could surrender her land to the state and be allotted land by the Government, as widows are on a “priority” list of persons to whom land can be allocated. She can try for peace with her brother-in-law and seek permission to farm her land with it going to him on her death or she could adopt his 20 year old son - as she has no children of her own-and he would inherit the land.

So far, all the suggestions for mediation appear to accept that Teeza’s right to her inheritance will be set aside by her brother-in-law , and that the courts cannot help her. At present, these and other alternative actions are being considered by Teeza , who after a decade of attempts to get the law to uphold and enforce her rights , remain a poor village woman at the mercy of her relatives.

The testimony from a number of African woman illuminate the tyranny of mourning and burial rites and the way in which they are ruthlessly used to strip widows and their children of their homes and dignity.

The stories recounted here illustrate the fact that in certain areas of Nigeria, it is considered a crime for a woman to lose her husband .It is considered the duty wives to ensure that husbands do not fall ill, are not attacked by armed robbers or killed in accidents.

Four years ago, Esther’s husband was killed in a car crash, leaving her with three children. On the day of his death, his relatives treated her with hostility, barred from her bedroom and told the house no longer belonged to her. She was called a witch and accused of killing her husband, and told to sleep in the servants quarters.

On the day of the funeral, her husband’s body was washed, she was told to drink the water as a sign that she had no hand in his death. Then she was abducted, taken to a shrine in a nearby forest, where her head was shaved and certain concoctions poured over her. She was being to forced to drink the concoctions, when her relations stormed the shrine and rescued her from certain death.

She left the village immediately after the funeral, but she was saved by the fact that her husband had left a will which enabled her to reclaim her property.

Esther was lucky - but Angela was left penniless when her husband, a well-to-do cement merchant died six years ago. He was attacked by armed robbers and before Angela was told, his relatives appropriated the three shops he owned and then accused her of being the cause of his death. She was told that if she flouted the orders of her father-in-law, she would be a dead woman.

Immediately after the funeral, the relatives came and took away all the furniture and were about to take her children as well, but she defied them and held on to her children. They were penniless, and she now manages to support her family on her salary as a primary school teacher.

Another tale of the cruelty and greed of relatives comes from Arit, who when young married a rich, older man. They had four children, a duplex apartment and a car. After eight years of marriage , he died suddenly and Arit was hospitalised for a week after collapsing from shock and hitting her head.

When she returned home, her house was stripped of all her belongings and she was accused of killing him by witchcraft and warned that if she came to the village for his burial, she would be killed. She was taken in by her elder brother who helped her to prove ownership of the apartment. She had no money so she rented out the apartment and with her children moved into the servants quarters. With the money she received from the rent, she has been able to set up a stall in the market selling baby clothes.

These events happened three years ago and she is now still recovering from the trauma, shunned by former friends and living with her children in straightened circumstances.

In the three testimonies related above, the women were saved from utter destitution because they were able to retrieve some property, but in the case of Mary, this did not happen.

Already living in dire poverty with an alcoholic husband and estranged from her middle class family because of her alliance with a shoemaker, Marywent to live with him when she was 16 and at the time of his death, when she was 32 years old, she was the mother on nine children. They were living in a one-roomed thatched house, the children were not in school, and Mary had rags for clothing.

Despite the fact that his family knew that he was an alcoholic and took drugs, they still accused her of killing him and after the funeral, his brothers came and took his clothes, the bed, the old and torn mattress and even his bedroom slippers.

Because they owed the landlord rent, Mary and her children were evicted. They now live in a hut, with no support whatsoever.

But there are signs that the advocacy on behalf of widows which WRI and its counterpart NGOs in Nigeria has been carrying out is beginning to pay off. A number of men in Nigeria have begun to raise their voices against the obnoxious treatment of widows. These include Chief Eshiet Okutinyang,a community leader and Commissioner for Local Government in Akwa Iborn State of Nigeria who had called for legislation to protect the interests of widows in the society.

A clergyman, Rev (Dr) Levi Adegbe, has for the past three years, been taking care of widows and orphans, and has urged Nigerian men to plan for their families before their death. He has encouraged men whose cultures are hostile to widows to warn their relations never to subject their wives to such ill-treatment and also to give clear guidelines on how their wealth should be shared.