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Human Rights and Personal Law: Women in Sub-Saharan Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

Rhoda Howard
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Extract

In this paper I will discuss women’s rights regarding marriage, the family, and genital operations in the context of internationally accepted views of the individual rights of women. I focus upon these particular areas partly because the issue of female genital operations in Africa has been the subject of much popular attention in the last three years, but mainly because, given that women’s biological reproductive roles are so much more central to their lives than are the equivalent roles for men, their rights in these areas profoundly affect their ability to exercise their rights in other areas, i.e. in the polity and in the economy. For data I use examples from several English-speaking sub-Saharan countries.

Type
Research Article
Information
African Issues , Volume 12 , Issue 1-2 , Spring/Summer 1982 , pp. 45 - 52
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1982 

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References

Notes

This paper is based on part of a larger paper on women’s rights in English-speaking sub-Saharan Africa, containing sections on political and economic as well as personal rights. The larger paper was delivered at a conference on “International Human Rights: Dilemmas of Liberty and Development in Africa,” SUNY Buffalo, May 8, 1982, and is forthcoming in Claude E. Welch and Ronald I. Meltzer (eds.), Human Rights and Development in Africa (New York: SUNY Press, 1983). I would like to thank Drs. Welch and Meltzer for permission to print part of the paper in Issue. For their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper, I would like to thank Omega Bula, Graham Knight, Michael Levin, Harriet Lyons, Clairee Robertson, and Audrey Wipper. I would also like to thank Karen Poxon and her staff for their efficient preparation of this manuscript, and Barbara Freeze and the staff of the Interlibrary Loan Service at McMaster University for their assistance in obtaining source material for this paper.

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3. Proclaimed by the General Assembly of the United Nations, 7 November 1967 (resolution 2263/XXII).

4. Document CAB/LEG/67/3/Rev. 5. from the Organization of African Unity Ministerial Meeting on African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, 7-17 January 1981, Banjul, the Gambia.

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6. Ibid., p. 71.

7. Ibid., p. 74.

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9. Roberta Ann Dunbar, “Legislative Reform and Muslim Family Law: Effects upon Women’s Rights in Africa South of the Sahara,” paper presented at the African Studies Association, Philadelphia, (October 1980), p. 28.

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11. ECA 1980, p. 33.

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26. Ibid., p. 137.

27. Donegan, “Sierra Leone,” p. 73.

28. I owe this point to Harriet Lyons.

29. Economic Commission for Africa, “Report on five workshops in home economics and other family-oriented fields,” (1973) quoted in UN E/CONF.66/BP/3, World Conference of the International Women’s Year, Mexico City 19 June–2 July 1975, Regional Seminar for Africa on the Integration of Women in Development with Special Reference to Population Factors, p. 7.

30. UN A/CONF.94/35, Report of the World Conference of the United Nations decade for Women: Equality, Development & Peace, Copenhage, 14-30 July 1980, p. 13.

31. Schulter, Lusaka, p. 93.

32. Izzert, “Family Life,” p. 315.

33. Mack, Dolores E., “Husbands and Wives in Lagos: the Effects of Socioeconomic Status on the Pattern of Family Living,” Journal of Marriage and the Family 40, no. 4, (November 1978), p. 815 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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35. Ibid., p. 484.

36. Wipper, Audrey, “African Women, Fashion and Scapegoating,” Canadian Journal of African Studies 6, no. 2, (1972)Google Scholar, special issue on African women, Audrey Wipper, ed.

37. Southall, “New Morality,” p. 371.

38. Mack, “Husbands and Wives,” p. 809.

39. ECA 1980, p. 29.

40. Maina et al., “Kenya,” p. 200, Luckham, “Ghana,” p. 90.

41. Akingba, J. B., The Problem of Unwanted Pregnancies in Nigeria Today (Lagos: University of Lagos Press, 1971), quoted in Mack, “Husbands and Wives,” p. 808 Google Scholar.

42. Hosken, Fran P., The Hosken Report: Genital and Sexual Mutilation of Females (Lexington, Mass: Women’s International Network News, 1979)Google Scholar.

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44. Ibid., p. 507.

45. McLean, Scilla, et al., Female Circumcision, Excision and Jnfibulation: the Facts and Proposals for Change (London: Minority Rights Groups, 1980), p. 3 Google Scholar. This short, accurate and unbiased summary, prepared in consultation with many African women experts, is the best single source on matters concerning female genital operations.

46. Ibid., p. 3.

47. Esther Ogunmodende, “Female Circumcision in Nigeria,” quoted in Hosken, Report, “Case History: Nigeria,” p. 8.

48. Hosken, Report, p. 1.

49. McLean et al., Female Circumcision, p. 7.

50. Murray, Jocelyn, “The Church Missionary Society and the ‘Female Circumcision’ Issue in Kenya, 1929-32,” Journal of Religion in Africa 8, no. 2, (1976)Google Scholar.

51. Kenyatta, Jomo, Facing Mount Kenya (London: Heinemann, 1979, 1st ed. 1938), pp. 131–135 Google Scholar.

52. McLean et al., Female Circumcision, p. 17.

53. I owe this last suggestion to Omega Bula.

54. McLean et al., Female Circumcision, p. 10.

55. ECA 1980, pp. 43-44.

56. McLean et al., Female Circumcision, p. 19.

57. Hosken, Report, “Case History: Kenya,” p. 21.

58. Ogunmodende, “Nigeria,” in McLean et al., Female Circumcision, p. 18.

59. McLean et al., Female Circumcision, p. 6.