Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 1

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Women’s Land Rights in Post-Conflict #125 Angola July 2008 Robin Nielsen RuRurral Development Inst Institute’situte’s Repo Report r#125t #125 | |Women’s Women’s land land rights rights in post-conflict in post-conflict angola angola | 3

Acknowledgements This report was developed within the context of a USAID- funded project, Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola (the “Project”) . The Project was directed by ARD, Inc . and implemented by the NGO, Development Workshop, with technical assistance from ARD, Inc . and the Rural Development Institute (“RDI”) . All of these organizations contributed to the work focusing on women’s land rights; this report recognizes in particular the work of Renee Giovarelli and Safia Aggarwal, who conducted fieldwork in the Project’s pilot areas . The reports of Ms . Giovarelli and Ms . Aggarwal, which are referenced here and in the footnotes, provided the foundation and content for this report: • Renee Giovarelli, Angola Women and Land Issues (January 18, Executive Summary ...... 1. 2007)(On file with RDI) i . introduction ...... 3. • USAID-Angola (Safia Aggarwal), 2007 . Strengthening Land ii . Background ...... 3. Tenure and Property Rights in iii . methodology ...... 5. Angola: A Profile and Planning Tool for Women and Other IV . land systems ...... 6. Disadvantaged Groups in Pilot a . formal land systems for property rights ...... 7. Areas . B . customary system for property rights ...... 9. The format of this report follows a template developed by Renee V . legal and customary land rights for women ...... 10. Giovarelli for researching and a . marriage ...... 10. reporting on issues relating to women and land . See USAID, B . divorce, abandonment, separation, and division of property . . . 11. 2008 . Women and Property Rights: c . inheritance ...... 11 Findings from Four Country Case Studies and Standardized Tools for Vi . formalization and documentation of land rights ...... 12. Collecting and Reporting Findings . Vii . Women’s involvement in land transactions ...... 13. In Angola, Carolina Matheus Gomes, a lawyer and member of Viii . governance and Institutions ...... 13. the non-profit Associacao Maos a . political institutions ...... 13. Livres, and Helena Lowe Zefanias with Norwegian People’s Aid, B . religious institutions ...... 13. provided information that proved c . Women’s groups ...... 13. critical to this study . d . land administration and management ...... 14. e . dispute resolution bodies ...... 14. IX . access to information about women’s land rights ...... 17. X . conclusion and recommendations ...... 17. Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 1

Executive Summary

As it emerges from almost 30 years of civil war, Angola has worked hard to establish the rule of law in a highly pluralistic society. Although it has enacted legislation that articulates gender equity, customary laws and traditional practices prevail in the lives of most Angolans. These customs favor men over women, and, as a result, the majority of Angolan women remain trapped by illiteracy, limited economic opportunities, and the need to care for children and relatives. With 70 percent of Angola’s population living on less than $2 per day, and more than half the population reliant on agriculture for their livelihoods, secure land tenure is a critical issue.

While the last decade has witnessed • Design legal literacy campaigns for the enactment of formal land laws, women. Women lack knowledge the majority of Angola’s population-- of their legal rights, including their including many government officials--is land rights, marital property rights, unaware of the terms of the 2004 Land and inheritance rights . Absent that Law . Not surprisingly, many (if not most) knowledge and knowledge about the of the provisions of the law are not ability to exercise their rights, equitable implemented . laws and procedures are irrelevant . Local NGOs, women’s organizations, However, the Government of Angola’s community groups, and other (“GoA”) delay in implementing the 2004 interested persons and entities are Land Law and regulations provides an usually best positioned to design and opportunity to design a strategy for implement legal literacy campaigns . protecting and improving women’s These entities and individuals rights to land in Angola . work directly with the population, This report explores both the formal and have knowledge of customs and customary laws that affect women’s capacities, and are familiar with In rural areas, sobas property rights, examines issues of existing practices . continue to control access to widowhood, divorce, polygamy • Engage government officials at all and girl’s inheritance and provides levels on land issues. Government land. Women interviewed recommendations for strengthening officials at all levels lack knowledge women’s rights to land, including efforts to: of the land law, regulations, and reported a range of experience • Conduct targeted research country- procedures for implementing the laws, with the sobas in their land wide. The actual land tenure situation including the formalization of land in most of Angola is generally unknown rights and granting of concessions . management roles; some to everyone except the residents of Critically, in many areas the GoA those regions, and even less is known also does not have the institutions sobas support the land rights about the land rights of women . In and capacity necessary to support such a void, a little research in each implementation . Any strategy to of women and actively assist of the regions of the country will go support women’s rights to land must women in disputes over a long way toward ensuring that include or be linked with a broad any strategy is actually designed to plan for assisting relevant government land rights while others may support women’s existing rights and officials in understanding the laws address the major barriers to women’s impacting land rights (both formal and be less helpful or actively access to land and land tenure customary) and be implemented in security . tandem with institution and capacity opposed to women’s rights building . In addition, women are under-represented in all of the to land. Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 2

country’s decision-making bodies . include an understanding of women’s laws and the principles that guide their Currently 34 of 183 parliamentarians customary rights and the necessary decisions and help refine and revise and three of the government’s 27 evolution of those rights to a state of those principles to meet standards of ministers are women, and less than true gender equality as contemplated equity and fairness . one percent of the sobas are women . in the Constitution and Family Code, • Support the work of legal aid centers Encouraging women’s participation that consideration will almost certainly and land rights lawyers. Legal aid in decision-making bodies will also be neglected . The rights formalized centers and land rights lawyers will support efforts to strengthen women’s will fall far short of what could have likely be required to do the heavy rights . been achieved for women and other lifting necessary to ensure that disadvantaged groups . • Develop and pilot procedures for women’s land rights are enforceable . the formalization of land rights • Provide assistance and training to Legal aid centers can be encouraged that integrate customary law and local traditional authorities regarding to take test cases, to help disseminate practices to the extent possible land rights, dispute resolution land rights information, staff or guide and appropriate. The process of procedures, and women’s rights . land dispute resolution bodies, and formalizing land rights under the Traditional authorities, such as sobas, develop legal literacy programs Land Law requires (1) identification are often the only administrators, designed to assist women in realizing of existing rights recognized under mediators, and adjudicators of their land rights . Legal aid centers can customary law and practice; (2) land rights whom women will ever provide women with advice regarding extension of such rights consistent with encounter . These individuals and local land rights during marriage and what constitutional and statutory principles institutions of governance and dispute actions to take in the event of divorce of equity and nondiscrimination; resolution generally apply customary or the death of a spouse . Legal aid and (3) regularization of such rights law and local practice to guide clinics can also serve as community consistent with the applicable law decisions regarding land rights . NGOs resource centers, providing women and regulations . Neither the Land Law and other entities that work with local with information regarding other nor any other formal or customary communities and local governance issues, such as domestic violence and law provides procedures to direct this bodies can develop programs to work HIV/aids . process . Absent clear procedures, that with sobas on identifying customary

In 2001, roughly 70 percent of Angola’s population lived on less than $2 per day, with 30 percent of those living in extreme poverty, on less than $0.70 per day. Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 3

I. Introduction II. Background1 peasant and commercial interests . The less populated areas in the eastern The formal and customary systems Angola has a land area of 486,213 and southern regions of the country governing land rights and transactions square miles and a population of are home to pastoralists and hunter- 2 in Angola are more favorable to approximately 14 million people . The gatherers in addition to sedentary women than in many African countries, country’s population is ethnically diverse; farmers 7. but they are not yet fully realized and the three most prominent tribes are the implemented . As it emerged from Ovimbundu (37 percent), Kimbundu (25 The percentage of the population almost 30 years of civil war, Angola percent) and Bakongos (13 percent) . living in urban and peri-urban areas enacted legislation that articulates One percent of the population is is increasing and putting pressure on principles of nondiscrimination and European, principally Portuguese . land and services . The vast majority gender equity . A progressive family Almost fifty percent of the country holds of the population in these areas lives law proactively provides for the rights indigenous beliefs; forty percent of the in informal settlements that originated of women in common law marriages population is Roman Catholic, and the as land encroachments with rights and the inheritance rights of daughters . balance is Protestant 3. recognized as a matter of practice However, despite the mandates of and customary law . The settlements While Angola’s official language is the formal law, customary laws and usually lack basic services and strain the Portuguese, the population speaks more traditional practices prevail . Those resources of the surrounding areas . than 60 different Bantu-group languages, customary laws and practices that including Umbundu, Kimbundu, Kikongo, The country is ranked 164th of the 175 govern the days of most Angolans favor Tchokwe, and Ovambo . Particularly countries listed on the United Nations men, and men dominate Angola’s in remote areas, the majority of rural Development Programme Human political, economic, and social spheres . 8 residents use local languages exclusively . Development Index . In 2001, roughly Some women, especially those with Literacy figures vary widely but estimates 70 percent of the population lived on education who are living in urban indicate an average of a 40 to 50 less than $2 per day, with 30 percent and peri-urban areas, are making percent literacy rate in adults, with the of those living in extreme poverty 9 progress . But, the majority of Angolan lowest percentages in rural areas and on less than $0 .70 per day . In 2005, women remain trapped by geography, among women (28 percent of rural approximately four percent of the lack of infrastructure, illiteracy, limited women are literate, compared to 46 population was living with HIV/AIDS; economic opportunities, and the need percent of men) 4. sixty percent of those cases occurred to care for children and relatives . Land among women . By the end of 2005, an Angola’s population concentrates rights provide a critical asset to all estimated 160,000 children had lost one in urban areas, along the coast, 10 women regardless of their circumstances or both parents to aids . and to a lesser extent in the central but most particularly those with the highlands . Approximately 60 percent Legacy of colonialism and war. The fewest options . The Government of of the population lives in rural areas, Portuguese landed in northern Angola Angola’s delay in implementing the and 85 percent of the rural population in 1482 . By the 16th century, Angola’s 2004 Land Law and regulations provides depends on small scale subsistence population was supplying slave labor an opportunity to design a strategy for agriculture 5. The productivity of small- to plantations in Brazil and Sao Tome protecting and improving women’s scale agriculture suffers in many and later to the Americas . By the 19th rights to land in Angola . regions from inadequate inputs, lack of century, slavery had begun to evolve infrastructure, limited access to markets, into a forced domestic labor system that and the presence of landmines 6. Fertile supported Angola’s growing plantation land in areas with access to services and and mining industries . Oppression by markets is in high demand and the focus colonialists and lack of access to the of increasing competition between most fertile land and other natural

1 this section contains information drawn from Justin Pearce, 2005 . AN OUTBREAK OF PEACE: ANGOLA’S SITUATION OF CONFUSION (Claremont: New Arica Books, Ltd); Terrafirma, 2005. Land Rights and Tenure Security in Kilamba Kiaxi, a report for CARE International, Angola (draft); and CARE Angola 2004. Transitional Program Initiative: Final Report to the United States Institute for Peace (October 2003-September 2004) . 2 to put the country in context, Angola has a slightly larger land mass than South Africa but has about one-quarter of South Africa’s population . The World Bank, 2004 . LITTLE DATA BOOK (Washington DC: The World Bank) . 3 embassy of Angola, 2002, at http://www .angola .org .uk/facts . 4 see e .g ., United Nations Population Division Basic Indicators, unicef org/infobycountry_. Angolastattistics .html and World Resources Institute, Indicators, http:// earthtrends .wri .org; USAID/Angola Annual Report FY 2005, at 3 . 5 Id.; see also UNIFPA statistics at www.unfpa.org/profile/angola.cfm. 6 In 2003-2004, 2.9 million hectares of the 3.5 million hectares of available agricultural land was cultivated. Earthtrends, 2003. Country Profiles: Agriculture and Food –Angola . 7 little background information exists regarding these sections of the country . This paper concentrates on provinces where research studies have been conducted and the results published . 8 UNDP 2006 Report, Human Development Index, hhtp://hdr .undp .org/hdr2006/statistics . 9 statistics maintained by Southern African Regional Poverty Network, www sarpn. org. za/documents/d0001037/index. . 10 UNAIDS, 2006 . Report on Global AIDS Epidemic Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 4

resources by indigenous people led government appoints the municipal Status of women. Angola has at to the birth of three different political administrator, who in turn appoints least nine major ethnolinguistic movements from within Angola in the comuna administrators . No formal state groups, most of which are considered early 1960’s .11 The power asserted by institutions currently exist below the matrilineal .18 While men dominate in these parties – often expressed violently comuna level . political, economic, and social position – led to Independence from Portugal throughout the country, the matrilineal Role of traditional authorities. Angola’s in 1975, followed by 28 years of civil system has left a mark . For example, as traditional leaders, known as sobas,15 war waged between the competing discussed more fully in Sections III and IV, are the local governing authority in political parties, UNITA and mpla . By the in some areas of the country daughters rural and many peri-urban areas . Sobas time peace was achieved in 2003, over as well as sons commonly inherit land traditionally handled a multitude of half a million people had been killed from their parents, and married couples local governance matters (including and an estimated four million people hold property jointly . land administration and management) internally displaced . in conjunction with village elders . The However, despite the egalitarian The country has evolved into a multi- distinction between the traditional content of the formal laws and some party democracy organized into three governance structure and the formal of the customary laws and practices, branches: the Executive (Office of the structure has blurred in the last decades: overall Angolan women have President, Office of the Prime Minister, in some areas, the sobas have steadily significantly less political, economic, Council of Ministers), the Legislative lost power to local government officials and social power than men . Women’s (National Assembly or Parliament), while in others they have become participation in the formal political and Judicial . The National Assembly’s employees of the government . and judicial system is limited, and legislative authority includes the power However, particularly in remote areas, women hold only 12 -16 percent of to enact laws relating to the land tenure sobas often continue to serve as the sole decision-making positions and are system, rural and urban leasing, the governing authority for the population . under-represented in the local decision- participation of citizens and traditional making bodies 19. Country-wide, fewer Particularly in areas where the capacity authorities in local government, and than one percent of sobas are women . and resources of local government are the nationalization and expropriation of Women hold a small percentage of jobs limited, the relationship between the property 12. Despite this allocated power, available in the formal economy, and formal government officials (comuna in practice, the President’s power is the jobs they do hold tend to be in the and municipal administrators) and primary . service sector 20. the traditional authorities is critical to The country is divided into eight a population’s relationship to formal provinces, 164 municipalities, and government 16. Other positions bridging 557 administrative units, known as the gaps between traditional and comunas .13 Comunas are further divided formal governance systems include into sectores, bairros, and blocos 14. coordenadores (coordinators) who Each province has its own government work in peri-urban areas as social with governors appointed by central mobilizers . In urban areas where there government, and vice governors are no sobas, or their power is diluted selected from a different political party by the growth of urbanization, there are than the governor . The provincial bairro coordinators and comissoes de moradores (resident committees) 17.

11 popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (“MPLA”), National Front for the Liberation of Angola (“FNLA”), and National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA”) . 12 constitution of the Republic of Angola, Art . 90 . 13 id ., Art . 55 . 14 Bairro commissars and Comissoes de Moradres (residential commissions) are the governing bodies in these local areas, to some extent filling the role of soba while also serving as a quasi-governmental body. The commissars and commissions have no official government standing, but continue to exist in many urban areas as holdovers from political parties organized in the years post-Independence . These residential commissions can be very powerful in some areas . In Kilamba Kiaxi, for example, the residential commissions are the institutions through which people obtain information regarding available land and are themselves a source of land. Terrafirma, 2005, at 18. 15 soba is an Umbundu word for customary leader or chief, but the term is used generically throughout the country . Other leaders are regedores (“big sobas”) and skulos, who oversee larger groups . See CARE-Angola 2004, at 5-6 . This paper uses the term “soba” to refer to all traditional leaders . 16 some of CARE-Angola’s recent work is focused on strengthening this link between rural communities and formal government . Noting that sobas are often elderly and may have limited access to the comuna sede (headquarters), among other efforts, CARE designed a comuna development structure, that supports the creation of committees that assist in interfacing with local government . See generally CARE-Angola, 2004 . 17 development Workshop, 2005 . Terra: Urban land reform in post-war Angola: research, advocacy and policy development, Development Workshop Occasional Paper No. 5 (Amsterdam: SSP) at 107-08; Terrafirma, 2005. Land Rights and Tenure Security in Kilamba Kiaxi, a report for CARE International, Angola (draft) at 39-43 18 descent groups include all persons descended from a common female ancestor through the female line . In some cases, junior males inherit from (or succeed to a position held by) older brothers; in others, males inherit from their mother’s brother . Marcia Greenburg, 1997 . Women’s Participation in Angola’s Reconstruction and its Political Institutions (WIDTECH USAID) . 19 swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) . 2000 . Towards Gender Equality in Angola, report, Swedish Embassy, Luanda . 20 greenberg, Marcia . 2000 . Women in Angola: An Update on Gender-Based Barriers and Opportunities for Democracy and Governance Work, USAID WIDTech, Washington, dc . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 5

III. M e t h o d o l o g y Fieldwork Location of field data collection: Overview of Huambo Province and pilot The fieldwork was conducted by The Project. This Report was prepared sites in the context of and with reference mixed teams of international and local to USAID Angola’s Land Tenure researchers during five trips taken Researchers collected field data in Strengthening Project (the “Project”), between January 2007 and March 2008 . Huambo Province, including within which was managed by ARD, Inc . and The fieldwork was designed to: Huambo city, the village of Mombolo (rural pilot area), the peri-urban implemented by the Angola-based • collect information to inform the settlement area of Bom Pastor, which NGO Development Workshop (“DW”), analysis of the applicable formal and includes the peri-urban pilot area, with technical assistance from ARD, Inc . customary laws governing land rights, Tchitutula, and Lumandi village . The and the Rural Development Institute the political structure of the country, benchmark survey was conducted in (“RDI”) . The Project grew out of the and the institutional capacity to the two pilot areas . need to strengthen land tenure and formalize and enforce land rights; property rights in Angola following The majority of the population of • provide an understanding of the the passage of the Land Law and Huambo Province is Ovimbundu and nature of the pilot communities; Territory Law in 2004 and implementing practices Christianity . The church regulations, which were enacted in • inform the creation of procedures has played an important role in the August 2007 . for formalizing land rights in the pilot province; in Mombolo village, many Desk and field research. The Project communities; residents received gifts of residential and agricultural land from the local church, partners undertook a variety of activities • provide information for the study of which had become a large landowner under these components, most notably land disputes and creation of a land in the region . designing and implementing pilot land dispute resolution system; rights formalization processes in two In rural areas, each household may • supply information for the study on areas of Huambo Province: Mombolo hold approximately six or seven plots; the land rights of women and other village (rural area pilot) and Tchitutula however, the average size of the disadvantaged persons; and (peri-urban area pilot) . In addition plots is small .25 Most households grow to the pilot experience, the following • collect information to evaluate the subsistence crops and some commercial desk and fieldwork contributed to the land rights formalization process in the crops (various grains and vegetables) . content of this report: pilot areas . Both men and women tend to work • background literature review relating on the same farm plots and engage in Researchers used rapid rural appraisal to Angola’s history, land laws and largely the same agricultural activities . techniques to collect data at both pilot policies, and women’s status and Nevertheless, men are more likely to sites . Researchers held semi-structured rights;21 engage in activities that involve the interviews with individual women, use of small machinery and clearing • review and analysis of relevant laws, individual men, married couples, other and preparation of land . Collection 22 regulations, and decrees; household residents, sobas and village of natural resources for subsistence elders, and local government officials. (e .g ., fuel wood, water) is primarily • in the pilot and nearby areas, The researchers also held meetings with individual interviews and focus group the responsibility of the women and separate groups of women and men in children . discussions with residents (women the rural pilot area and a nearby village .23 and men, separately and together), Some rural residents are employed traditional leaders, and local Researchers also met with local NGOs in towns and urban areas either on government officials; and individual professionals engaged in a seasonal or permanent basis . In land rights formalization, women’s rights • meetings with local NGOs, members peri-urban areas, such as the fairly and empowerment, dispute resolution, well established area of Bom Pastor in of the legal professions and judiciary; and rural development in Angola 24. and which the peri-urban pilot is located, nearly all women and men engage in • a benchmark survey conducted in various types of informal and formal the two pilot areas in August 2007, forms of employment . Many women surveying 330 people . make a living selling crops or prepared foods and dry goods (e .g ,. cooking oil,

21 the background research included the report entitled Angola Women and Land Issues (January 18, 2007), authored by Renee Giovarelli, and USAID-Angola, 2007 . Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: Land Law and Policy: Overview of Legal Framework (May 31, 2007) and sources cited therein . 22 this review and analysis is captured in USAID-Angola, 2007 . Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: Land Law and Policy: Overview of Legal Framework (May 31, 2007) . 23 in addition to visiting the pilot areas, one researcher visited Lumandi village in Caala municipality, Huambo province and conducted a focus group discussion with 18 women at one meeting and nine men at another meeting. See USAID-Angola, 2007. Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: a Profile and Planning Tool for Women and Other Disadvantaged Groups in Pilot Areas, at 3 . 24 Lists of individuals interviewed can be found in USAID-Angola, 2007. Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: A Profile and Planning Tool for Women and Other Disadvantaged Groups in Pilot Areas and USAID-Angola, 2007 . Managing Land-Related Disputes in the Land Rights Formalization Process . 25 according to the USAID (2005) land tenure assessment, the average subsistence farmer in Huambo cultivates approximately 0 .5 hectares of land . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 6

clothing and other consumer goods) in plot and several field plots. Only a few no piped water connected to the site . the local informal markets or in nearby households have any documentation of The area is expanding rapidly . cities . Other women hold formal a landholding .27 jobs in local hospitals, schools, and The village has water from a local government offices. Most households stream, which is used for crop irrigation . IV. land systems in the peri-urban area also have small Common crops include maize, banana, farm plots where women grow food for History. Like many developing countries, potatoes, tomatoes, mangoes, consumption 26. Angola has a highly pluralistic legal avocados, corn, mandioca and environment . Systems of formal and In both pilot sites and in the village of peanuts . During the banana season, customary law operate simultaneously, Lumandi, women (with assistance from excess bananas (and sometimes often in parallel, but almost wholly children) cultivate the field plots, collect tomatoes) are sold by the roadside up independent of the other system . water and firewood, cook, clean the from the village . Land systems, which are always highly residence and do the washing, and Peri-urban pilot site: Tchititula. Tchitutula reflective of a country’s history, are care for children and livestock . Female- is one of the informal settlement often among the most developed and headed households are in a particularly 31 areas in Bairro Bom Pastor on the sustained pluralistic environments . vulnerable position in both pilot sites . In outskirts of Huambo city . Tchitutula Angola is no exception . rural areas, male labor migration and has 360 families and a population of engagement in the cash economy Prior to the enactment of the current about 1,798 persons. Seventy-five are placing an increasing amount of land law in December 2004, Angola’s percent of the households are male- household and farming responsibilities land was subject to a series of legislative headed . The primary languages on women (and children) . In peri-urban efforts to direct land resources (primarily spoken are Umbundu and Portuguese . areas, households may have more rural land) to the hands of a few . From Approximately 90 percent of the livelihood options than those in rural colonial times through the 1990’s, residents have a monetary income, areas; however, cost of living is higher in Angola’s land laws attempted to with sources divided relatively evenly peri-urban areas and women who are identify and (in most cases) contain among the public, private, and informal separated, divorced, or in polygamous or circumscribe the land rights of the sectors . Female-headed households relationships often have no support from country’s indigenous population, have a higher incidence of employment men and may be while at various times supporting the in the informal sector, solely responsible for development of commercial farming while male-headed 32 meeting all livelihood and mineral extraction enterprises . Male labor migration households have a needs of the family . higher percentage In the colonial period, the Portuguese Rural pilot site: is placing an of income from the established large farms and plantations Mombolo village. increasing amount of formal sector 28. (fazendas) to grow cash crops for Mombolo is a small export, and many received titles to the Ninety percent of the village with 215 land they occupied . At Independence, household and farming plots in Tchitutula are households and Angola nationalized its land and the owner-occupied, and a population of responsibilities on majority of Portuguese vacated the 84 percent of residents about 1,075 persons . farms . The country’s subsequent efforts obtained their plots Approximately women. to collectivize the farms generally within the last four 80 percent of the failed, and by the 1980’s, most were years . Between 60-75 households are abandoned and production ceased . percent of residents male-headed . The In the wake of failed efforts, former with ownership rights obtained their primary language is Umbundu . All farm laborers and local residents often plots through land purchase 29. The but a few households are subsistence encroached on the land, using it for remainder received land through family farmers . Approximately 60 percent of subsistence farming . transfers and inheritance . Almost all households received their land through residents who purchased plots have In 1992, Angola adopted its first post- inheritance; the remainder obtained 33 documentation of the purchase . Independence land law . The law access to land through gifts of land from Approximately 70 percent also own a focused on surface use rights to rural the church, informal transactions within field plot.30 Some residents have access land for agricultural use and was limited the village, or transfers within the family . to electricity for generators, but there is in scope to issues of land access and Most households have a residential

26 USAID-Angola, 2007 . Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: Benchmarking Survey for Pilot Sites (“Benchmarking survey results”), at 3-8 . 27 Benchmarking survey results, at 11-12 . 28 id ., at 3-6 . 29 approximately ten percent of respondents stated they rented their plots . Id ., at 6 . 30 id ., at 6-7 . 31 see Meinsen-Dick, Ruth and Rajendra Pradhan . 2002 . Legal Pluralism and Dynamic Property Rights, CAPRi Working Paper No . 22 January 2002) . 32 Jenny Clover, 2005 . Land Reform in Angola: Establishing the Ground Rules in FROM THE GROUND UP: LAND RIGHTS, CONFLICT, AND PEACE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, Chris Higgins and Jenny Clover, eds . ( Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies) 33 law 21-C/92, Regulamentos de Concessoes, Decree 32/95 of 8 December and 46/92 of 9 September . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 7

titling 34. The law recognized the rights surprisingly, therefore, many (if not been efforts to formalize land rights of those who received concessions most) of the provisions of the law have recognized under customary law and in the post-Independence period but not been implemented . In some practice . The United Nation’s Food and did not recognize customary rights of cases, officials are unfamiliar with the Agriculture Organization (“FAO”) assisted indigenous populations and did not terms of the law and operate under rural communities in Huila Province apply regularize the rights of a combination of for recognition of rural community land . those who had informally superseded legislation Development Workshop (“DW”) assisted occupied urban areas The majority of and past practice . In occupants of an informal settlement in and abandoned farms . other cases, officials a peri-urban area of Huambo city apply Not surprisingly, a period Angola’s population, take administrative for recognition of land rights under the of intense land grabbing actions regarding land formal law 37. The Project that provides the ensued . The government including many matters that have no context and source of data for this report granted new concessions government officials, effect under formal also engaged in land rights formalization for fazendas, and state- law . The confusion in in rural and peri-urban pilot areas . See owned plantations were is unaware of the the implementation descriptions in Sections II and V . privatized and sold . of the formal law is A . F o r m a l l a n d s y s t e m s f o r Commercial farmers terms of the 2004 compounded by the property rights received rights to fertile lack of supporting agricultural land, and Land Law. mechanisms and In contrast to some systems of customary large cattle ranchers institutions, which are law, which when unchecked and received rights to prime either nonexistent or lack isolated from natural processes of social grazing areas 35. capacity to perform change can reinforce entrenched rural functions necessary to support the Land hierarchies and power structures, formal The law was criticized by civil society Law . The result is predictable: to date, tenure systems potentially provide a groups and some government officials few people in Angola have secure land welcome neutrality . Formal systems for failing to recognize the customary rights cognizable under the Land Law . are often based on constitutional land rights of the people . The need to proclamations of equal rights, principles create a fair and transparent process for As a practical matter, however, the of fair treatment, and the rule of law . formalizing rural and urban land rights paralysis affecting the sphere of formal The laws in formal systems are codified, was apparent. After significant effort by law appears to have little impact on public, and usually applicable to civil society groups (whose substantive daily life . In large measure, the country’s all persons – regardless of economic concerns were ultimately not reflected population accesses, holds, and status, ethnic group, gender, or other 36 in the new law), Angola passed the transacts land in the informal sphere, classification.38 2004 Land Law . without regard for the formal law . The population maintains strong and Angola’s formal legal system is based Under the 2004 Land Law, almost persistent views of land rights, based in on a statutory or code system imposed all of Angola’s land is owned by the large measure on traditional principles by the Portuguese during the colonial government . Individuals may obtain and customary practice, which have in period . The key general legislation that use rights to land depending upon many cases evolved into some level of impacts land rights in Angola include the the character of the land and the individualized rights, especially in urban Constitution of the Republic of Angola, planned use . Land rights contemplated and peri-urban settings (although also the Civil Code, and the Family Code, by the Land Law include long-term within traditional rural communities) . relevant provisions of which are outlined leases, surface rights, and rights to Among the views held is the widespread below . land occupied by a traditional rural belief that individuals and households community . In some cases, the GoA • Constitution. The Constitution of the can acquire ownership rights to land may grant rights to urban land that Republic of Angola was adopted and that owners have substantial power are akin to “freehold” interests . The in 1992 . Because Angola does not over the land, including the right to law contains no statement regarding have a comprehensive, stand-alone alienate it freely . Land is in demand, the land rights of women and other written statement of its land policy, the informal land market is active disadvantaged groups . the Constitution provides one of the in many areas, and land values are only expressions of possible land policy The majority of Angola’s population, increasing . including many government officials, Land projects. The limited work that is unaware of the terms of the 2004 donors and local NGOs have undertaken Land Law and the regulations . Not in Angola to address land issues has Land is in demand. 34 a handful of decrees passed in the same period tried to address urban land issues . For example, Decree 46A granted provincial governments the right to grant concessions for urban land for period of 25-60 years . 35 in many cases, the war prevented the concession holders from beginning commercial farming, and they have only begun to resume farming in the last few years, creating potential conflicts with populations that have settled on the farms, or use the farm for fodder and other resources during the war . Development Workshop, 2006, at 63-64 . 36 see e .g ., discussion of process in Development Workshop, 2005, at Chapters 10-11 . 37 these projects are described in Development Workshop, 2005, sections 7-12 . 38 thomas Carothers, 1998 . The Rule of Law Revival, 77 FOREIGN AFFAIRS, March-April 1998, at 95 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 8

objectives . Some of the pertinent declaratory judgment on the legality which the GoA can confer transferable principles articulated are: (1) the of a government action or nullify a rights to individuals and collective country’s status as a democratic state government action . persons . The general terms of the Land based on the rule of law, dignity of the Law do not extend to public land that • Family Code (1989) (“Codigo da individual, pluralism of expression and cannot be the subject of private land Familia”). The Family Code governs political organizations, respecting and rights, such as public roads or reserved issues relating to the composition of guaranteeing rights and freedoms of land . The Land Law also does not the family, marriage and marital rights, persons as individuals and members extend to privately owned land, such and parental obligations to children . of social groups; (2) the equality of as land owned by the Catholic Church In pertinent part, the Family Code all people without regard to race, and foreign embassies 46. provides for the equality of women and color, ethnicity, sex, religion, level of men within marriage, recognition of The Land Law broadly classifies education, economic, and social registered and common law marriage, conferrable land within its private status; and (3) the equality of men spousal rights to separate and domain as urban, rural, and rural and women within the family 39. community property (at their election), community land . Rural communities the Constitution provides that the GoA and the obligations of spouses in the are legal entities and have standing to has sovereignty over territory, water, event of separation and divorce 44. defend their collective rights under the air space, soil, and subsoil, and that all Land Law . The GoA holds the “direct Land policy. Angola does not have a natural resources, including land, are domain” and has the authority to confer stand-alone, comprehensive, written the property of the Goa 40. The GoA or transfer the “useful domain” of land statement of its national land policy shall respect and protect people’s to individuals and entities .47 The state and, accordingly, has no clear, property, including land owned by can grant: (a) private property rights overarching principles to guide land peasants although the GoA retains to urban land; (b) useful customary related legislation and regulations or the right to expropriate property in the domain to rural communities; (c) useful to prioritize plans for economic growth public interest .41 civic domain; (d) surface rights; and (e) and development with issues relating temporary occupation rights . • Civil Code (2001) (“Codigo Civil”). to land access, tenure security, land The Angolan Civil Code is based on use, and land administration . The 2004 The transfer of land rights does not the Portuguese Civil Code and is the Land Law contains no policy statements include a right to any natural resources . fundamental source of civil law in regarding the rights of women and The recipients’ use of all land rights the country . The Civil Code contains other marginalized populations and no received remains subordinate to the sections on private obligations and statement of non-discrimination in land economic and social purposes for contract rights, commercial law, access and the regularization of informal which the GoA granted the rights, and debtor-creditor relations, property land occupations. The Land Law reflects all GoA land grants and transfers are rights, and succession . Despite the no awareness of the barriers to land subject to the requirement of useful passage of the 2004 Land Law, the access, tenure security, and general and effective usage of land, which is Civil Code continues to govern many well-being faced by the majority of the established by land evaluation and land land issues – either because they country’s population, including women . use instruments 48. fall outside the ambit of the Land 2004 Land Law and regulations. The The law requires those who occupy land Law or because the Land Law and country’s Lei da Terras de Angola (Lei without rights or title recognized by the Regulations specifically defer to the 09/04, de 9 de Novembro) (“Land Law”) Land Law to apply for a concession Civil Code as the governing law 42. became effective February 2005 . Under title within three years of the date of For example, the Civil Code provides the law, the GoA owns and exercises publication of the regulations (estimated terms relevant to tenancy rights, ultimate authority over all land and to be September 2010) or risk loss of inheritance of property, and the natural resources and has an irreversible rights .49 GoA’s expropriation of property 43. The right to expropriate land . The Land Law Civil Code also provides procedural reaches all rural and urban land to remedies such as the right to seek a

39 articles 2-3, 18, and 29 . 40 articles 6 and 10 . 41 Article 12. Any confiscation of land in accordance wit the law is valid and irreversible. Article 13. 42 These areas are identified in the outline of the Land Law and Regulations in the next section. 43 Significantly, the Civil Code used to provide for some protection for those occupying land informally for long periods, but the 2004 Land Law trumped hoset provisions, subjecting those with informal rights to eviction if they fail to apply for a concession in a timely fashion . 2004 Land Law, Art 84 . 44 see e .g ., Civil Code, 2001, Sections 289 and 1276 . 45 the paper discusses the Family Code in more depth in Section Vii . 46 articles 21-29 . Estimates of the amount of privately held land vary, but do not exceed ten percent of total land, and the amount may be far less . 47 articles 37 and 70 . 48 articles 10, 18, and 37 . 49 Under the Regulations, time periods established in the regulations can be extended once for an equal period . (Articles 6-7) A local Angolan lawyer believes that the time extension provision would allow for the extension of the three-year period to file applications for concessions to be extended to six years. The process to make application for an extension under such a legislative provision is relatively simple, but those interviewed were uncertain what standards are applied to determining a request for extension (though both believe the request would not be arbitrarily denied) . Personal interview with Carolina Matheus in Luanda, January 2007 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 9

• Rural land access for community members. All members of the community (and those joining the community who are deemed trustworthy of integration including, most recently, ex-combatants53) are entitled to have use of a portion of land 54. Inheritance is the main source of rural land for most B . C u s t o m a r y s y s t e m s f o r • Land ownership. Under customary property rights50 law, land is regarded as owned by community members, followed by a universal deity and the ancestors arrangements for leasing, borrowing, While the last decade has witnessed of living occupants; land is held by and sharecropping . In addition, the the enactment of formal land laws, a community (or individuals within soba may allocate land to households customary law has substantial continued a community) and administered for and individuals . The soba’s allocation relevance in Angola . For a majority of the benefit of the community by the will usually be based on the size of Angola’s population, some measure of soba . This belief has persisted among the household, planned use for the customary law – along with traditional much of the Angolan population land, and the availability of land to practices – govern land access, control through the period of Portuguese allocate . of land and its production, transfers of control, the nationalization of land at land, and land use . • Urban/peri-urban land access. In Independence, 28 years of civil war, most urban and peri-urban areas, No statistics are maintained that identify the displacement of approximately land access (particularly in informal what percentage of the country’s land three million residents, settlements that is under private tenure as opposed to and the adoption of distinguish most land communal tenure, but much of Angola’s two formal land laws . Customary law holdings in those areas) communal land has evolved into some • Land management is less dependent 51 type of more individualized tenure . In and administration. may be inherently on inheritance and Huambo Province, which is distinguished Traditionally, the soba inadequate to allocations of land by from much of Angola by the fertility was (and in many traditional authorities of its land, organizations working with areas still is) responsible the challenges to and more dependent land issues report that individualized for managing the on the land market . tenure is the norm, while in areas with community’s land, land rights created Individuals and low demographic pressure and more making allotments households desiring isolated communities (especially in the to individuals by the pace of plots often begin by eastern and south eastern regions of the and households, the anticipated staying with relatives, country) some form of communal tenure establishing the areas then renting a plot, and 52 is more common . of land for common economic ultimately buying a plot . In urban and peri-urban Even in areas where land rights are use, setting rules areas, if sobas are highly individualized, informal practices regarding communal development. present, they are often are prevalent . Most of the country’s land and its resources without any authority population is unfamiliar with the formal (and, in some over land allocation . For land laws and considers its rights and circumstances, the use land matters, bairro commisoioners obligations relating to land governed by of land allotted to individuals), and and residential committees often evolving principles of customary law and adjudicating land disputes . In rural serve as the source of land and traditional practices . Those customary areas, the sobas continue to oversee tenure security . These institutions are principles and practices related to land transactions and the inheritance informal, arising from political parties land can be highly localized . Most, of land . In peri-urban areas, the in the years following Independence, however, share the following general comuna administrator fills this role or but they may also have qualities of characteristics: shares authority with the soba . traditional authorities . In areas where

50 the information in this section is derived from the following sources: Jenny Clover, 2005 . Land Reform in Angola: Establishing the Ground Rules in FROM THE GROUND UP: LAND RIGHTS, CONFLICT, AND PEACE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, Chris Huggins and Jenny Clover, eds . ( Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies) and Paulo Filipe, 2005 . The Right to Land and a Livelihood: Kuanza Sul (Oslo: Norwegian People’s Aid); and Norwegian People’s Aid, 2006 . The Land and Us: Rights and Obligations (draft training manual on land law, on file with RDI). 51 We have been unable to locate any statistics and upon inquiry, were told that the government does not gather or maintain that data . Some NGOs have conducted studies that include land tenure information, but the data cannot be extended beyond the study areas . See e .g ,. Filipe, 2005 . The Right to Land and a Livelihood and Rede Terre, 2004 . Levantemento Sobre Concessoes de Terras na Provincia do Kwanza-Sul, 1992-2002 (Luanda: Rede Terra) . 52 development Workshop, which works on land issues in Huambo Province, estimates that most of the land in the province, including rural land, is subject to some form of individualized tenure . 53 one study of ex-combatants’ sources of land found, however, that ex-combatants were more likely to purchase or rent land in a village than obtain land through the soba . Development Workshop, 2006, at 41-43 . 54 the rights of women are discussed in the following section . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 10

municipal offices are functioning, a by the matrilineal system traditionally reached the three-year requirement for coordinating commission may handle recognized in many communities, but, common law marriage can make an a land request with participation despite this tradition, women’s rights are application in court for a Declaration of of the provincial level department considered less then those enjoyed by Joint Ownership of Property . of the Ministry of Public Works and men . None of the residents of the pilot National Institute for Spatial Planning A. Marriage sites interviewed were aware of the (“INOTU”) 55. provisions in the Family Code . However, The Family Code recognizes both As currently conceived and practiced, in the two pilot areas, joint ownership of registered marriages and de facto customary law may be inherently property during marriage was reported (common law) marriages . The Family inadequate to the challenges to land to be customary: married couples Code requires spouses to register rights created by the pace of the expect that they will jointly own land marriages, but recognizes the de facto anticipated economic development that they purchase or are given (such union of couples who have cohabitated in Angola . While a few provisions of as in grants of land by the church in for three years and are otherwise the 2004 Land Law and Regulations Mombolo) during marriage or at the capable of entering into a registered recognize customary law or traditional time they are married . In the peri-urban marriage 58. The vast majority (anecdotal practices, the ambit of customary law pilot area of Tchitutula, the majority of evidence suggests 80 percent or more) is highly circumscribed and always residents acquired their plots after they of marriages in Angola are de facto subject to formal law . As competition were married and within the last four marriages because formal marriage for land and urbanization increases and years . Women and men interviewed requires registration, which is time authority of traditional rulers continues stated that they believed they had joint consuming, bureaucratic, and costly . to erode or be diluted by growth of rights to the land . Several couples in Weddings can also be costly . governmental bodies, formal law Tchitutula (peri-urban will increase in importance . Unless Separate and community pilot area) reported strategic efforts are made to include property. Angola that they discussed the traditional systems and institutions in recognizes that married Both parents have subject of how they the design of formal mechanisms and (registered and de equal responsibility would own the property institutions, they will rapidly become facto) individuals may obtained during their impotent . Those who ignore (or who hold separate property, to support their marriage before they are ignorant of) the formal legal system community property, or began living together . In will be disadvantaged, and losses in the both . The Family Code children. every case, the couple currently informal land rights are unlikely requires couples to elect agreed that they would to be recovered 56. whether to hold property jointly own their land . individually within the Dowry. Many Angolan tribes recognize marriage or to adopt a community a system of dowry . Dowry is based on property approach . If the couple elects V . L e g a l a n d the bride’s family’s resources and may a community property system, the customary land be gifts of clothing or livestock . The 57 spouses each have equal, undivided rights for women average dowry in the rural pilot area is shares to property earned and received three or four cows . In some areas of the Angola’s formal law establishes a during the marriage . If the couple country, the groom’s family may also be constitutional right of non-discrimination makes no election, the presumption of required to pay lobolo (“bride price .”) on the basis of sex and provides for the community property governs 59. In the rural pilot area, for example, the equality of men and women within the groom’s family customarily provides family . As detailed below, the Family A spouse cannot alienate community gifts of cattle, clothing, and food to the Code governs rights and responsibilities property without the consent of the 60 bride’s family . of spouses in registered and unregistered other spouse . At death, community property carries no automatic right marriages . However, the egalitarian Polygamy. The Family Code does not of survivorship; spouses can gift their nature of the formal law is not fully permit polygamy,61 but the practice 50 percent share as they wish at their realized in practice . As noted in Section is common in the rural and per-urban I, Angola’s customary law is influenced death . Those spouses who have not

55 Terrafirma, 2005, at 39-43; Development Workshop, 2005, at 107-08; Development Workshop, 2006, at 139. 56 a general discussion of these principles in a broader African context is included in FAO, 2006 . Agrarian Reform, Land Policies, and the MDGs: FAO’s Interventions and Lessons Learned during the Past Decade, produced for the 24th Regional Conference for Africa, ARC/06/INF/7, and the studies cited therein . 57 the content of the section is based on the cited sources, including the background paper prepared by Renee Giovarelli, Angola Women and Land Issues (January 18, 2007), and the gender report for the Project researched and drafted by Safia Aggarwal, USAID-Angola, 2007. Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: A Profile and Planning Tool for Women and Other Disadvantaged Groups in Pilot Areas. See also Filipe, 2006, The Right to Land and a Livelihood, the fieldwork conducted in the course of the Project, an interview with Carolina Matheus (Gomes), a Lunada-based Angolan lawyer (and member of the non-profit Associacao Maos Livres) who has experience in the area of women’s rights, land issues, and general civil practice, conversations with Helena Lowe Zefanias, who was been active in the Norwegian People’s Aid land tenure study, the NPR draft materials for public awareness building on women’s land rights, and conversations with staff of Development Workshop and CARE in January 2007 . 58 articles 112-113 . 59 articles 49-53 . 60 article 56 61 article 25 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 11

pilot areas . Women in polygamous division of property themselves with the land, sharecrop, or squat on former relationships who were interviewed in involvement of the families as necessary . commercial farms, making sporadic the course of the Project stated that Disputes are referred to elder family payments to landlords . In all of these with fewer men available for marriage members or respected members of the cases, the land that women can they had no option but to marry into community . No one interviewed knew access is most likely to be among a polygamous household . In the of anyone who pursued a property case the lowest quality .63 In some areas, peri-urban pilot area, one woman through legal channels, including use the sobas may support the rights of interviewed who was in a polygamous of the Family Council established by the divorced women seeking land from their relationship resided with her birth family Family Code . fathers . However, the women’s success and did not receive financial support depends on the active support of the Divorce, separations, and abandonment for the children . Her husband supports sobas as opposed to settled principles of of the wife are not uncommon in rural only the wife with whom he resides . In customary law 64. and peri-urban pilot areas . Women another case, the husband provides in rural areas often move to their Mombolo is an exception . In Mombolo, both wives with a house, but he provides husbands’ villages upon marriage and divorce and separations are rare . financial support for raising the children often live and cultivate land owned Couples often seek assistance from to only one wife . by the husband’s family . In some extended family members, elders, B . D i v o r c e , a b a n d o n m e n t , areas, if the women are subsequently and/or the soba to help resolve s e p a r a t i o n , a n d di v i s i o n abandoned, separated, or divorced, intra-household disputes before they of property the former husband or relatives of the escalate . During interviews, women and Under the Family Code, in the event husband may force the women from the men stated that if a woman is divorced of divorce, the court must take into husband’s land . Whether these women or abandoned, the families will make account the life conditions of the are welcome back in their natal homes some allowance for her by providing a spouses, the children, and the causes is a matter of local custom and far from house and some piece of land to farm . of the divorce in assured . If families refuse to provide for a woman, she can go to the soba who will make determining the Men and women an arrangement on her behalf . Women disposition of the family interviewed in the peri- may not receive a full half share of residence, but the Code If the women urban pilot area reported marital property in the event of divorce provides no formulas for that if a couple separates are subsequently or separation, but all interviewees stated dividing property . The or divorces, or the that women receive a sufficient share to Family Code prescribes husband abandons his abandoned, support their needs . It is unknown how that both parents have wife, the woman would common this practice is in other parts of equal responsibility to separated or not have rights to any Angola . support their children, of the husband’s family and if children remain divorced, the assets . Property is not C. Inheritance with the mother, the divided as prescribed former husband, The succession provisions of Angola’s father must pay for under the community Civil Code allow for testamentary maintenance for the property system, and 62 or relatives of the disposition of property in accordance children . the customary practice with the testator’s wishes . Intestate husband, may force of holding property Individuals interviewed provisions grant property to surviving jointly during marriage in Luanda and the city spouses and children equally .65 As a the women from the reportedly does not of Huambo,who are in matter of practice, however, daughters survive the end of common law marriages, may not inherit land or will inherit a husband’s land. the marriage in these were unfamiliar with smaller amount than sons . Families communities . the Family Code . All divide their land based on the theory reported that in the In these cases of loss of land rights, that daughters will receive land when event of divorce most couples will divide women are unlikely to have the assets they marry, while sons will be required their property from the marriage equally, necessary to lease or purchase land to provide sufficient land to support a although provision for children will be and they are often forced to resort to wife and children and care for elderly made a priority in making property the most insecure and least lucrative parents 66. allocations . The couple will handle the arrangements: they may borrow

62 article 11 . 63 similarly, ex-combatants often resorted to borrowing and renting arrangements to access land, and most relied on their families for such arrangements . Id ., at 41-45 . 64 even in areas where there are female sobas, women’s land rights are not assured . Filipe, 2005, at 27 . 65 These statements require verification and further development upon receipt of the new translation of these provisions of the Civil Code. While local lawyers stated the Code prohibited discrimination in inheritance on the basis of sex, at least one provision favors male children to manage the affairs of the decedent, suggesting a need for further translation and research . (Art . 2080(4)) 66 one group of approximately eight men interviewed in Mombolo in March 2008 on the subject of inheritance stated that if their sons were lucky enough to marry wealthy women who had their own land, the men would give more of the land to their daughters because the sons would not need so much . However, they believed their sons should have some parcel of land of own as a matter of principle . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 12

Many of the women interviewed widow . The study found that only 23 be evicted from their husbands’ land in Mombolo, and a few of those percent of widows use the land left by if widowed . In contrast, women in interviewed in Tchitutula, stated that the deceased husband, and six percent Lumandi reported that eviction of they had inherited land from their natal were cultivating land provided by the the widow by the in-laws was not families . Some women treated the soba . The sobas reported that they help uncommon . If requested, sobas may land as their own, while others either widows to obtain other intervene and if the considered the land owned jointly with land for cultivation so matter could not be their husbands or under their husbands’ they can remain in the The government resolved, the soba would sole control despite the origin of the village if they wish .68 All give the widow another land . Most of the women interviewed women in the survey had of Angola has plot of land . Residents in both pilot locations in March 2008 gone to their husbands’ made little effort and sobas alike agreed stated that they planned to have their home after marriage, that land farmed by daughters inherit some land . In a few and almost all widows to formalize land widows often has low cases in Tchitutula, women stated that said that they preferred productivity; some they planned to give their plots to their to stay in their husband’s rights. attribute the productivity sons because the sons would provide village because they to the poor quality of for them in their old age and would also had community ties lands given widows, be expected to care for their sisters as there . The survey found while others note that necessary . that 47 percent of the widows did not widows often have inadequate labor . go back to their home village upon the Daughters who do not receive land Childless women are among the most death of their husbands, and in every through inheritance have the right to vulnerable, particularly in rural areas . If village, some widows with children had challenge the decision by bringing an a couple is unable to produce children, no land 69. action under the Civil Code . However, the problem is often blamed on the very few women are likely to do so As a matter of customary law and woman . Moreover, multiple births of because : (1) women often have no practice, widows may remarry (and this girls are sufficient reason for a man to knowledge that they have a legal is not uncommon for younger widows), seek another wife . If the woman has no right to family land; (2) they have no but remarried widows lose any rights children (and in particular no sons), she knowledge of how the legal system to land from their previous marriages . may be abandoned . If her husband functions and no notion, therefore, of In general, elderly widows and those dies, her in-laws can dispossess her of how to pursue a claim; (3) they often with grown children appear to have her land . The practice of levite (marrying do not have the financial resources to more secure rights to their deceased brother of the deceased husband) is pursue a claim; and (4) they would be husbands’ lands than younger widows, a common in some areas of Angola and very unlikely to raise the issue of a right to result reflecting the stronger community protects the widow from becoming land within the family, let alone bring a ties of the older widows in their in-laws’ destitute . legal action against a family member 67. village than of the younger widows . Widows. Cases of widowhood are Customary practices regarding children common in the rural and peri-urban of the widows vary . Women in both VI. Formalization pilot areas . If widowed, the fate of pilot sites reported that if they were and documentation the woman largely depends upon the widowed, inheritance would depend o f women’s lan d families and the soba . Women are upon the husband’s acceptance of rights often at risk for eviction by their in-laws, the children . Other women in Lumandi particularly in rural areas . In some cases, village noted that whether or not a Angola’s Land Law and regulations widows are allowed to stay on their widow’s sons would inherit land would make no explicit mention of the rights husbands’ land but only as holders in depend upon the age of the children of women . However, the Constitution’s trust for the children; they do not have at the time of the husband’s death . If statements of gender equality and the right to lease or sell the land, and the the widow leaves to return to the birth nondiscrimination on the basis of sex are land’s use is controlled by the in-laws . In family but has adult sons, they would arguably implied in all legislation through other cases, the widow may decide to inherit her husband’s land . However, if a the supremacy clause . The Land Law’s leave because of tensions and conflicts widow with young children returns to her provisions regarding land concessions with the in-laws . If a widow returns to birth family, the children are unlikely to and processes to formalize land rights her birth family, she may or may not receive land from her in-laws . should, therefore, (as a matter of formal receive a plot to farm from her parents law) apply equally to women and men . The sobas in the pilot areas appear to or brothers . have favorable views regarding widows There has been little opportunity to date One study in Kuanza Sul Province found retaining rights to their husbands’ land . to test whether principles of gender that when a man dies, his relatives Each of the three sobas interviewed equality extend to land legislation in often take the rights to his land, not his stated that the women should not practice . Since the enactment of the 2004 Land Law, the government of

67 personal interview with Angolan lawyer working in family law, Luanda, January 2007 . 68 the sobas withdraw use rights if the women re-marry (Filipe, 2005, p . 31) 69 id ., at 30 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 13

Angola has made little effort to formalize transfers because the land was thought years . Some women purchased their land rights (of either women or men) in of as being held in trust for ancestors plots with their own resources, often Angola . and unborn generations and could not, saved from employment in civil service therefore, be permanently transferred . or teaching . In many cases, married The GoA has granted some concessions However, as communal land systems spouses both contributed their earnings of agricultural land to commercial evolved to include individualized tenure, and saving to purchase the plot . Land is interests under the prior land law, and the system recognized scare, and land sales are now very rare . there continues to be permanent transfers . In During interviews conducted in March an active informal land urban areas and regions 2008, no residents interviewed reported market . However, land In order for land with rich agricultural that they were considering selling rights formalization land, the majority their land . Some of the parcels were activities under the 2004 to play a key of landholders have rented out, although most commonly to Land Law were held individualized rights, members of extended families . in abeyance awaiting role in economic and these areas support the regulations, which growth and poverty active informal land were published in August markets 71. 2007 . Since that date, alleviation, a V III. G o v e r n a n c e those involved in the Residents of Mombolo and Institutions: land rights formalization functioning land and Lumandi villages W o m e n ’ s project that provides the reported during various Participation and context for this report administration rounds of fieldwork that Leadership have been unable they lease or sell land to to obtain any GoA system must support others within the village A. Political Institutions acknowledgement of secure, easily when necessary to raise Women are under-represented in all of land rights under the extra cash . In Mombolo, the country’s decision-making bodies. Land Law or information transferable land there have been no Currently 34 of 183 parliamentarians and about GoA plans for land sales to third parties three of the government’s 27 ministers granting concessions or rights. from outside the village are women. Less than one percent of the 70 formalizing rights . or neighboring villages sobas are women. within the last 20 years . However, use mortgages B. Religious Institutions V II. w o m e n ’ s are common . Under a use mortgage, Churches are critical sources for involvement in land a landowner grants another village education, social services, and t r a n s a c t i o n s resident the right to cultivate a parcel information for women in Angola . Most of his land in exchange for a lump sum women are affiliated with a church and Under the Land Law and Civil Code, payment . When the landowner repays participate in the church’s sociedade the transferability of land depends on the debt to the resident, the landowner da senhoras (women’s group) 72. In the nature of the land right held . For retakes possession of the land . Momobolo, women attend separate example, holders of concessions for Women do not appear to have a high church services every weekday morning urban land may sell their concession level of involvement in land transactions beginning at 5 a .m . and socialize as in accordance with the auction in the rural areas . If they own land with a group for a period of time after the procedures set forth in the law and their husbands, the husbands tend to conclusion of the service . In Tchitutula, regulations . However, holders of manage land transactions such as women regularly meet as a group after more temporary concessions may be leases . However, where women have the Sunday church service . During restricted from transferring any portion of their own land, they may enter into lease the meetings, women socialize and those rights . arrangements, especially when the land may discuss a range of matters and The formal law has little impact on the is inherited from their natal family . Some community issues . transfer of land in the rural and peri- widows interviewed consider themselves C. Women’s organizations urban pilot areas . as temporary custodians of land for their children, and only the male children As a matter of culture and practice, Customary law and practice allow would have the authority to sell or lease the women living in the rural and peri- landholders to alienate land temporarily land . urban pilot areas do not form groups for through a variety of means, including social, economic, or political purposes . leases, rental agreements, borrowing In Tchitutula, most residents purchased Women report engaging in some arrangements, and loans . Historically, their land from private parties or activities together, such as selling goods customary law prohibited permanent middlemen within the last four or five in the market, traveling to other areas,

70 Usaid . 2005 . Land Tenure and Property Rights Assessment for Angola, USAID Washington DC 71 see sources cited for the content of Section III, including Jenny Clover, 2005 . Land Reform in Angola: Establishing the Ground Rules in FROM THE GROUND UP: LAND RIGHTS, CONFLICT, AND PEACE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, Chris Huggins and Jenny Clover, eds . ( Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies) and Paulo Filipe, 2005 . The Right to Land and a Livelihood: Kuanza Sul (Oslo: Norwegian People’s Aid); and Norwegian People’s Aid, 2006 . The Land and Us: Rights and Obligations (draft training manual on land law, on file with RDI). 72 greenburg, 1997 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 14

or attending to tasks such as gathering the land rights of women and actively Land disputes fall into the following firewood, but they often chose to be with assist women in disputes over land categories: government land female relatives or are solitary (or with rights, while others may be less helpful or expropriations and attendant evictions; their children) . There are no informal or actively oppose women’s boundary disputes; formal women’s groups or cooperatives rights to land . third party (non-locals) in Mombolo or Tchitutula 73. assertions of rights to land; In peri-urban areas, The populations access by marginalized D. Land administration comuna administrators interviewed… groups (e g. ,. widows, and management and bairro-level divorced women, ex- authorities and comissoes In order for land to play a key role predict that the combatants, pastoralists, de moradores – bodies in economic growth and poverty daughters seeking that operate between alleviation, a functioning land number of land inheritance rights, hunter- the formal and informal administration system must support gatherers); ambiguity spheres -- provide access related conflicts secure, easily transferable land rights in nature of land rights to land and “regularize” and be capable of: (1) maintaining held; encroachment encroachments . The will increase comprehensive, clear, accessible land (with special concern population recognizes records; (2) creating mechanisms for the substantially in the about conflicts between these bodies, which grew efficient and effective transfer of land occupants of former out of the operations for a reasonable fee; and (3) providing years ahead. commercial farms of political parties after accessible avenues for handling land versus new owners Independence, as disputes fairly, predictably, and in a taking possession under having authority over timely fashion .74 Angola’s system does government concession); land in urban and peri-urban informal not currently support these elements land speculation/land grabbing; and settlements . Women interviewed in of a functioning land administration land transfer disputes . In many study Tchitutula who participated in the system – either in design or in practice . areas, the number of ongoing disputes purchase of their plots report that they The system suffers from an incomplete has, to date, been minimal . However, were able to deal directly with local design, incomplete (or nonexistent) in almost all areas, the populations administrators and experienced no data on land holdings, a lack of records, interviewed report concern about the difficulties with the process. cumbersome, time consuming, and impact of increased development and imperfectly understood transaction E. Dispute resolution bodies76 growth on land access and tenure processes, high transactions costs, lack of security and predict that the number The mechanisms and processes for information and processes to determine of land related conflicts will increase the resolution of land disputes are land values, and lack of institutional substantially in the years ahead 77. capacity to create and maintain records housed within parallel formal and Angola’s land dispute resolution and manage transfers 75. traditional systems . The formal systems are inaccessible to the majority of the framework includes both adjudicatory The informal systems of land population because of cost, location, and conciliatory systems 78. Traditional administration and management and procedural formalities . The formal village-based systems applying operate in a void that makes women’s systems also lack social legitimacy customary law generally offer participation or leadership in land and are simply not functioning in large participatory, conciliatory methods of administration and management parts of the country . Traditional systems dispute resolution . The adjudicatory particularly difficult. In rural areas, sobas have more social acceptance but are system resides in the courts, which apply continue to control access to land . localized, have limited impact, often formal law and established procedures . Women interviewed reported a range of lack neutrality, reflect existing social There are limited links between the two experience with the sobas in their land hierarchies at the expense of equality, systems, and the populations served by management roles; some sobas support and are impotent against the formal law . each are distinct 79.

73 In some cases during fieldwork for the Project, researchers found that women in some communities were more responsive during individual interviews than interviews held with groups of women . 74 World Bank, 2003 . Land Policies for Growth and Poverty Reduction (Washington DC: The World Bank), at 79-98 . Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights Land Law and Policy. See Robin Nielsen, 2007. Background Report: Land Dispute Systems in Angola (on file with RDI). 75 care-Angola, 2005, at 14 . 76 This section draws on R. Nielsen, 2007. Background Report: Land Dispute Systems in Angola prepared for the project (on file with RDI) and USAID-Angola 2007. Strengthening Land Tenure and Property Rights in Angola: Managing Land-Related Disputes in the Land Rights Formalization Process . 77 development Workshop, 2005 . Terra: Urban land reform in post-war Angola: research, advocacy and policy development, Development Workshop Occasional Paper No. 5 (Amsterdam: SSP); Terrafirma, 2005. Land Rights and Tenure Security in Kilamba Kiaxi, a report for CARE International, Angola (draft); and CARE Angola 2004 . Transitional Program Initiative: Final Report to the United States Institute for Peace (October 2003-September 2004) . Jenny Clover, 2005 . Land Reform in Angola: Establishing the Ground Rules in FROM THE GROUND UP: LAND RIGHTS, CONFLICT, AND PEACE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, Chris Higgins and Jenny Clover, eds . ( Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies) and Paulo Filipe, 2005 . The Right to Land and a Livelihood: Kuanza Sul (Oslo: Norwegian People’s Aid) Development Workshop, 2006 . WHAT TO DO WHEN THE FIGHTING STOPS: CHALLENGES FOR POST-CONFLICT RECONSTRUCTION IN ANGOLA, Paul Robson, ed . (Luanda: Development Workshop) 78 this section draws on information presented in Jenny Clover, 2005 . Land Reform in Angola: Establishing the Ground Rules in FROM THE GROUND UP: LAND RIGHTS, CONFLICT, AND PEACE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, Chris Higgins and Jenny Clover, eds . ( Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies); Paulo Filipe, 2005 . The Right to Land and a Livelihood: Kuanza Sul (Oslo: Norwegian People’s Aid); and Norwegian People’s Aid, 2006 . The Land and Us: Rights and Obligations (draft training manual on land law, on file with RDI); Development Workshop, 2005, Terra; and Terrafirma, 2005. 79 one link is evident in Huambo, where, if a soba is unable to resolve a dispute, the parties take the matter to the comuna or municipal administrator . Development Workshop, 2005, at section 7 .2 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 15

Traditional dispute resolution. Historically, by an individual or household where the formal legal system, the payment Angola’s sobas governed the people no written land records are available . of compensation or damages, is often within the soba’s established jurisdiction Discussions with the sobas and NGOs in unavailable because people have (usually a village) . In conjunction with both rural and peri-urban areas revealed limited resources and few assets . village elders and local councils, sobas that the most common disputes that Third, as currently conceived and traditionally handled a multitude of they receive are not related to land, practiced, the traditional system of local governance matters, land matters rather they were related to domestic dispute resolution is not and conflict resolution. In peri-urban violence . For those designed to handle and urban areas, sobas are often not disputes that were land claims brought by present or may have limited power, related, most were intra- Customary law outsiders under formal and bairro coordinators and comissoes or inter-family disputes; law . While a few de moradores (residential committees) cases of disputes with restricts the rights of provisions of the 2004 often fill the soba’s role.80 Particularly in outsiders were noted as Land Law recognize areas where the capacity and resources rare occurrences . The women when they customary law or of local government are limited, these only land-related cases traditional practices, the customary and community institutions received by the sobas are most vulnerable. ambit of customary law may carry more authority than formal from women in the rural is highly circumscribed governmental institutions 81. pilot site were widows and always subject to requesting access to The social legitimacy of the traditional formal law . As discussed more fully in the land . In urban areas, OMA in Luanda and community institutions allow sobas following section, while a court will likely receives frequent cases of conflict to continue to manage conflicts within seek evidence from a soba regarding a between husbands and wives related to their jurisdictions . Sobas and their land case within the soba’s jurisdiction housing, such as cases where a woman assistants mediate and resolve disputes . and will treat any evidence offered with and her children may be evicted if a Public spaces known as ondjangos respect, the soba’s own ruling on the man decides to sell or rent the house . provide areas in which a village may controversy carries no weight with the hold informal courts, a process that The traditional system of dispute court . A soba’s legal authority is trumped lends transparency to matters of public resolution has some weaknesses . First, to by formal law . concern . The procedures followed by the extent that the process employed Formal law and institutions of dispute sobas in resolving matters vary among by the soba seeks consensus, the resolution.84 Angola’s formal legal system locations, but, in general, they apply process reinforces accepted standards is based on a statutory or code system settled principles of customary law, and of behavior and existing hierarchies imposed by the Portuguese during the their approach is highly conciliatory 82. and social structures . Conciliation and colonial period and revised multiple mediation can trivialize disputes by When women were asked where they times following Independence . Angola’s putting current grievances in context are likely to go in case of a dispute, judicial system is structured around a of past behavior, history, and family their responses varied . In the rural area central Supreme Tribunal, which operates status . Thus, to the extent that a party of Mombolo, women stated that they primarily as an appellate court (although to a dispute seeks application of a would approach the soba or the pastor . can exercise some original jurisdiction) . new standard – such as equality of In the peri-urban area, women stated Trial courts with original jurisdiction land access regardless of gender – she that they would take a land dispute to are provided for at the provincial may need to convince the soba (and the pastor, their birth family, the soba, and municipal levels 85. The President community) of the value of the principles or a neighbor (in that order) . According appoints the Supreme Tribunal (without she wishes to have applied or pursue her to the representative in the formal court confirmation by the National Assembly) claim under formal law in a civil court to of Katchiungo, women do occasionally and provincial judges, who in turn obtain the desired decision . access the formal courts for assistance appoint municipal judges . Judges need but mainly for cases of domestic violence Second, there are often very limited not be licensed lawyers and are often and never for land-related disputes 83. solutions to many disputes regarding lay persons . Under the Civil Code, land land . Boundary disputants may reach disputes can be brought at the provincial There appears to be little connection a compromise . A plot may be divided or municipal level . As a practical matter, between formal and informal dispute among competing claims . Land may be almost all cases are heard in provincial resolution mechanisms and laws, awarded to one party at the expense courts: as of 2000, all 18 provinces had although sobas are often used as of another . However, beyond these functioning provincial courts; municipal witnesses in formal courts and called types of remedies, few options exist . courts were operating in only 12 of 140 upon to support claims of land ownership One of the most common remedies in municipalities .

80 Terrafirma, 2005, at 19. 81 in answer to questions regarding land tenure security, ex-combatants stated they believed their land rights more secure if they had gone through a process of conferring with the soba regarding their land rights . Development Workshop, 2005, at 53-54, and 87 . 82 note that in some peri-urban and urban areas, there is some evidence that the residents, who almost uniformly take their disputes to the bairro coordinators and residential commissions, offer informal payments to those groups as part of the process and in an effort to ensure a favorable result. See Terrafirma, 2005, at 19. 83 see also Norfolk, Simon et al . 2004 . Land and Natural Resource Management System Assessment, Bie Province, Care-International . 84 the information in this section is drawn from Filipe, 2006, The Right to Land and a Livelihood, and personal interviews with Carolina Matheus (Gomes), a Lunada- based Angolan lawyer (and member of the non-profit Associacao Maos Livres), Helena Lowe Zefanias with Norwegian People’s Aid in Luanda, and the staff of Development Workshop and CARE in January 2007 . 85 constitution, Article 125 Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 16

The Constitution, Civil Code, and 2004 contingency in Angola . No statistics Mandatory mediation and arbitration. Land Law and regulations provide regarding the nature of parties pursuing The 2004 Land Law includes an three different avenues for resolution land claims in Angola are currently kept, alternative dispute resolution (“ADR”) of disputes, available in various but the length of lawsuits and costs of system; the law mandates mediation circumstances: engaging legal counsel make it unlikely and conciliation and requires non- that any individual without significant binding arbitration before a provincial • Civil court procedure; resources would proceed with a private level tribunal .88 The law gives few • Mediation and arbitration (ADR); and lawsuit without assistance . As women details . The provincial government is generally have fewer financial resources responsible for organizing arbitration • Traditional dispute resolution (limited). than men, are less likely to be educated, panels . The panels will conduct Land cases brought in civil court and have less mobility because of proceedings in Portuguese and must in Angola are long and costly . An obligations to family, they are even less reach a decision within 6 months of the average case initiated at the provincial likely to look to the formal court system date it is empanelled 89. court level may run two years, and for justice . According to local practitioners, Angola twice that time is not unusual . Appeal Legal aid. Angola’s Bar Association has no experience with ADR, except in of the trial court’s decision is a matter has the foundation for a pro bono the context of commercial contracts of right, and the case may take several representation system . The Bar where provisions are drafted to meet years to be heard . The status quo Association requires all registered international standards and the parties relating the land will be maintained lawyers to donate a are usually sophisticated business during term of the case, certain amount of time interests who are well represented absent extraordinary each year to providing by legal counsel . Trial attorneys are circumstances . The majority of legal services to the familiar with the process of negotiation In regular (non pro bono) Angola’s population, poor . A person desiring and settlement as a required pre-trial cases, the Angolan Bar an attorney under the activity in Angola, but the process Association has minimum including many program applies with the occurs before a trial judge and does not fee schedules that the Bar Association, which involve mediation . ADR has yet to be lawyers must follow . government officials, in turn applies some institutionalized within the court system, Lawyers can (and most basic eligibility criteria, and the vast majority of lawyers (and do) charge much more is unaware of the including verifying persons managing ADR procedures) are than the minimum, terms of the 2004 the person’s need for unfamiliar with the processes involved . setting their fees for free services . The Bar Angola has had insufficient experience disputes based on the Land Law. Association assigns with ADR system to make a judgment value of the case, the eligible applicants about how women’s rights will be client’s availability to pay, for free legal aid to a treated in an ADR system 90. the time the case will lawyer or law firm. The Permissible use of traditional dispute require, and the firm’s practices. Many Bar pays the expenses of the case and resolution process. The Land Law firms charge a fee of $100 to discuss gives a small stipend to the lawyer . provides that where rural communities the case with a lawyer, whether or not The system is criticized because lawyers have conflicts related to the rights of the lawyer takes the case 86. If the case routinely avoid service or, within firms, possession, management, use and involves land, the lawyer’s fee will take they assign the cases to the most junior production of rural community land, into account the value of the land; in lawyers . Where poor clients are lucky or issues related to the useful domain title disputes, the lawyer may charge 10 enough to receive an experienced of rural community lands, those percent or more of the land value . lawyer, the lawyer often has little communities shall use their customary Attorney’s fees are non-refundable. incentive to spend the time necessary methods of deciding the dispute . Clients must pay 35 percent of the total to provide the best representation . No Anyone aggrieved by the decision charge in advance of any work . The statistics are kept on how many pro reached has a right to appeal to the client must pay the balance of the bono cases are taken but the number is mandatory mediation, conciliation, and fee before any settlement, the close estimated to be very low and does not arbitration process outlined in the law of trial, and any verdict . Fees are provide an accessible avenue into the and described above 91. The section not dependent on results obtained; court system for most people 87. is silent on several key points such as there is no practice of taking cases on whether sobas can apply principles of

86 In Luanda, average hourly fees for a lawyer are between $100-200 . 87 Personal interviews with Carolina Matheus (Gomes), a Lunada-based Angolan lawyer (and member of the non-profit Associacao Maos Livres), Helena Lowe Zefanias with Norwegian People’s Aid in Luanda, and the staff of Development Workshop and CARE in January 2007 . 88 Articles 77-78 . 89 Article 80 . Law 16/03, July 25, 2003 governs the process of voluntary arbitration and is referenced as a framework for this mandatory provision . 90 The lack of capacity within the formal judicial system has led civil society to fill the void, and some NGOs have undertaken capacity building in the area of alternative dispute resolution techniques. See, e.g., Development Workshop, 2006, at 94. However, while civil society can play a vital role in filling the current void and is certainly better qualified and better positioned than the government to handle many garden variety disputes at this point, the country’s long-term interests will be best served by building capacity within its formal institutions . 91 Article 82 . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 17

customary law, even if they conflict with One of the challenges ahead will be • Design legal literacy campaigns for formal law, whether non-community to preserve such valuable elements women. Women lack knowledge members are bound by the traditional and procedures of the customary of their legal rights, including their procedure, and what law applies in legal system that already have social land rights, marital property rights, arbitration or trial . In addition, the legitimacy, while charting an evolution and inheritance rights . Absent that traditional system used will be subject toward a single legal system governed knowledge and knowledge about to the weaknesses and limitations by principles of fairness, equity, the ability to exercise their rights, the discussed above, including the potential transparency, conciliatory processes, equitable laws and procedures are to perpetuate historical biases and and other desired principles . irrelevant . Given the high levels of existing social hierarchies . At this stage, much still remains to be illiteracy among women, dissemination understood about Angola’s population, of any written materials is not likely to especially its women . The information be very effective means of reaching IX. Access to that is available reveals uneven women . Likewise, because women information about progress . In the peri-urban pilot area, in Angola appear to have limited women’s land rights most women hold their plots jointly experience with organizing groups with their husbands . Women who and engaging in joint activities, more Women receive little information are educated may have positions individualized methods (such as radio regarding land rights under the formal in civil service or work as teachers addresses) of providing information to law system . Both women and men and medical aids . Some women are women are necessary . Local NGOs, in the pilot sites were familiar with purchasing house plots as security for women organizations, community land rights and property rights under themselves before they are married groups, and other interested persons customary law and practice and able to or after divorce or the death of their and entities are usually best positioned articulate how land would be dealt with husbands . But traveling only three to design and implement legal in various situations such as divorce or hours by car from the peri-urban pilot literacy campaigns . These entities death . None interviewed had the same site to the rural pilot site, the situation and individuals work directly with knowledge of rights under the formal is very different . In Mombolo, women the population, have knowledge law system . are trapped by geography, lack of customs and capacities, and With regard to information about of infrastructure, illiteracy, limited are familiar with existing practices the Project, some women received economic opportunities, and the need – knowledge that is essential to a information from the soba, and some to care for children and relatives . They successful campaign . from the Project demarcation teams . have far fewer options . Customary law • Engage government officials at all In the rural areas, sobas may receive restricts the rights of women when they levels on land issues. Government information from different sources to are the most vulnerable, such as in the officials at all levels lack knowledge pass on to community members . The event of abandonment, divorce, or the of the land law, regulations, and soba in Mombolo received Project death of a husband . procedures for implementing the laws, information from the Project staff . Land rights provide a critical asset including the formalization of land to all women regardless of their rights and granting of concessions . circumstances, but most particularly Critically, in many areas, the GoA X. Conclusion and those with the fewest options . The also does not have the institutions recommendations GoA’s delay in implementing the 2004 and capacity necessary to support implementation . Any strategy to The formal and customary legal systems Land Law and regulations provides an opportunity to design a strategy for support women’s rights to land must governing land rights and transactions include or be linked with a broad in Angola are more favorable to women protecting and improving women’s rights to land in Angola . The following plan for assisting relevant government than in many African countries . The officials in understanding the laws formal laws articulate principles of are recommendations for possible components of a strategy: impacting land rights (both formal and nondiscrimination and gender equity customary) and be implemented in and proactively provide for the rights • Conduct targeted research country- tandem with institution and capacity of women in common law marriages wide. The actual land tenure situation building . and the inheritance rights of daughters . in most of Angola is unknown to most The customary system and traditional everyone but the residents of those • Develop and pilot procedures for practices favor men, who dominate regions . Even less is known about the the formalization of land rights the political, economic, and social land rights of women . In such a void, that integrate customary law and spheres . However, the matrilineal a little research in each of the regions practices to the extent possible heritage shared by many Angolan of the country will go a long way and appropriate. The process of tribes has had a positive influence on toward ensuring that any strategy is formalizing land rights under the the position of women; in many parts of actually designed to support women’s Land Law requires (1) identification Angola women inherit land, hold marital existing rights and address the major of existing rights recognized under property jointly and share decision- barriers to women’s access to land customary law and practice; (2) making authority with their husbands as and land tenure security . extension of such rights consistent with a matter of customary law and practice . constitutional and statutory principles Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 18

of equity and nondiscrimination; • Provide assistance and training to aid centers can be encouraged to and (3) regularization of such rights local traditional authorities regarding take test cases, to help disseminate consistent with the applicable law land rights, dispute resolution land rights information, staff (or guide) and regulations . Neither the Land Law procedures, and women’s rights. land dispute resolution bodies, and nor any other formal or customary Traditional authorities such as sobas develop legal literacy programs law provides procedures to direct this are often the only administrators, designed to assist women in realizing process . Absent clear procedures that mediators, and adjudicators of their land rights . Legal aid centers can include an understanding of women’s land rights whom women will ever provide women with advice regarding customary rights and the necessary encounter . These individuals and ensuring land rights during marriage evolution of those rights to a state of local institutions of governance and and what actions to take in the event true gender equality as contemplated dispute resolution generally apply of divorce or the death of a spouse . in the Constitution and Family Code, customary law and local practice to Legal aid clinics can also serve as a that consideration will almost certainly guide decisions regarding land rights . community resource center, providing be neglected . The rights formalized In some cases, those sources provide women with information regarding will fall far short of what could have women with land rights . However, other issues of particular concern, been achieved for women and other those sources can also be applied to such as domestic violence and HIV/ disadvantaged groups . discriminate against women . NGOs aids . and other entities that work with local the Project that created the context A project undertaking all of these communities and local governance for this report has created a draft components would be ideal, but even bodies can develop programs to work operations manual and conducted one or two will make a difference . So with sobas on identifying customary pilots for the formalization of land little has been done for women’s land laws and the principles rights . This initial effort rights in Angola that the challenges may that guide their decisions needs to be followed often appear daunting . But, they should and help refine and revise by many more . Once not be paralyzing . The opportunities The majority of those principles to meet a sufficient amount to use the Land Law to provide standards of equity and of experience has Angola’s population, women with the basis to substantially fairness . been documented, improve their lives and the lives of their a standard set of including many • Support the work of families are as great as the perceived procedures can be government officials, legal aid centers and challenges to such a goal . developed that are land rights lawyers. Legal suitable to be used is unaware of the aid centers and land country-wide . rights lawyers will likely be terms of the 2004 required to do the heavy lifting necessary to ensure Land Law. that women’s land rights are enforceable . Legal Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 19

BIBLIOGRAPHY Alden Wily, Liz . 2003 . Governance and Land Relations: A Review of Decentralization of Land Administration and Management in Africa (London: International Institute of Environment and Development) . Amnesty International, 2007 . Angola: Lives in Ruins: forced evictions continue, AI Index12/001/2007 (London: AI) Bledsoe, David and Carlos Pinto, 2002 . Land Law and Policy Assessment, report prepared for USAID under the auspices of the National Democratic Institute (on file with RDI). Boudreaux, Karol. 2005. The Human Face of Resource Conflict Property and Power in Nigeria, Global Prosperity Initiative Working Paper (Washington, DC: George Washington University) . Bruce, John. 1998. Country Profiles of Land Tenure in Africa. http://pdf .wri .org/ref/elbow_98_synthesis .pdf . Camara, L. December 2005. Individuation Des Acteurs Et Evaluation Des Possibilites De Negociation Dans Les Conflits Fonciers En Angola . UN fao . CARE Angola 2004 . Transitional Program Initiative: Final Report to the United States Institute for Peace (October 2003-September 2004) . CARE Angola . 2004 . Transitional Program Initiative: Final Report to the United States Institute for Peace (October 2003-September 2004) . Carothers, Thomas, 1998 . The Rule of Law Revival, 77 FOREIGN AFFAIRS, March-April 1998 Clover, Jenny, 2005 . Land Reform in Angola: Establishing the Ground Rules in FROM THE GROUND UP: LAND RIGHTS, CONFLICT, AND PEACE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, Chris Huggins and Jenny Clover, eds . ( Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies) Comerford, mg . 2005 . The Peaceful Face of Angola: Biography of a Peace Process (1991 to 2002) . Conciliation Resources. http://www.c-r.org/our-work/accord/angola/women-conflict.php / FAO/Wfp . 2006 . Crop and Food Supply Assessment Mission to Angola, Special Report, 12 July 2006 . http://www .fao org/. docrep/009/j8081e/j8081e00 .htm Development Workshop, 2006 . WHAT TO DO WHEN THE FIGHTING STOPS: CHALLENGES FOR POST-CONFLICT RECONSTRUCTION IN ANGOLA, Paul Robson, ed . (Luanda: Development Workshop) . Development Workshop, 2005 . TERRA: URBAN LAND REFORM IN POST-WAR ANGOLA: RESEARCH, ADVOCACY AND POLICY DEVELOPMENT, Development Workshop Occasional Paper No . 5 (Amsterdam: SSP) Essang, S.M. 1981. Reflections on Provisions of the Land Use Act in THE LAND USE ACT: REPORT OF A NATIONAL WORKSHOP, J.A. Omotola, ed . (Lagos: University of Lagos) . FAO, 2006 . Agrarian Reform, Land Policies, and the MDGs: FAO’s Interventions and Lessons Learned during the Past Decade, produced for the 24th Regional Conference for Africa, ARC/06/INF/7 Filipe, Paulo, 2005 . The Right to Land and a Livelihood: Kuanza Sul (Oslo: Norwegian People’s Aid) Fuller . 1971 . Mediation: Its Forms and Function, 4 S cal . l . REV . 305, 325 . Giovarelli r . January 2007 . Angola, Women and Land Issues, Desk Study for the USAID/Angola Land Tenure Strengthening Project . González de la Rocha, Mercedes . 2000 . Private Adjustments: Household Responses to the Erosion of Work . CIESAS Occidente (Guadalajara, Mexico) . Greenberg, Marcia et al . WIDTECH, Usaid . 1997 . Women’s Participation in Angola’s Reconstruction and in Its Political Institutions and Processes Executive Summary . ifad . Rural Poverty Report . http://www .ruralpovertyportal .org/english/regions/africa/ago/geography .htm Library of Congress. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+ao0078) Malaquias, Assis. Ethnicity and conflict in Angola: prospects for reconciliation. Effects of War on Women. http://www.iss.co.za/ BOOKS/Angola/6Malaquias .pdf . McAuslan, Patrick, 2003 . BRINGING THE LAW BACK IN: ESSAYS IN LAND, LAW, AND DEVELOPMENT (Burlington: Ashgate) Meinsen-Dick, Ruth and Rajendra Pradhan . 2002 . Legal Pluralism and Dynamic Property Rights, CAPRi Working Paper No . 22 January 2002) . Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 20

BIBLIOGRAPHY, continued Norwegian Refugee Council. 2004. Profile of Internal Displacement: Angola, Compilation of the information available in the Global IDP Database of the Norwegian Refugee Council (as of 1 October, 2004) . Also available at http://www .idpproject .org Nader, Laura and Henry Todd, Jr . 1978 . (New York: Columbia University Press); Christopher Moore . 1996 . THE MEDIATION PROCESS: PRACTICAL STRATEGIES FOR RESOLVING CONFLICTS (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers) . Nielsen Robin, March 2007. Background report: land dispute systems in Angola (on file with project and RDI). Norwegian People’s Aid, 2006. The Land and Us: Rights and Obligations (draft training manual on land law, on file with RDI). Pearce, Justin, 2005 . AN OUTBREAK OF PEACE: ANGOLA’S SITUATION OF CONFUSION (Claremont: New Arica Books, Ltd) Rede Terre, 2004 . Levantemento Sobre Concessoes de Terras na Provincia do Kwanza-Sul, 1992-2002 (Luanda: Rede Terra) . Republic of Angola European Community Joint Annual Report 2003 . 2004 . http://ec.europa.eu/development/body/csp_rsp/reviews/2004/AO_final_2004.pdf Robson, P (Ed). 2006. What to do when the Fighting Stops: Challenges for post-conflict reconstruction in Angola. Development Workshop Occasional Paper No 7, Development Workshop . Smock, d . and Prendergast, J . 1996 . NGOs and the Peace Process in Angola . United States Institute of Peace Special Report No 16: www .usip .org/pubs/specialreports/early/angola .html (13 June 2007) . Southern African Regional Poverty Network, www .sarpn .org .za/documents/d0001037/index . Terrafirma, 2005. Land Rights and Tenure Security in Kilamba Kiaxi, a report for CARE International, Angola (draft) USAID/Angola Annual Report FY 2005 . UN fao . n .d . Annex I Description of Action: Institutional support to decentralized land tenure and management institutions to promote equitable rural development in selected Provinces of Angola, UN FAO Project Terra Plan . UNDP 2006 Report, Human Development Index, hhtp://hdr .undp .org/hdr2006/statistics . United Nations Population Division Basic Indicators, unicef .org/infobycountry_Angolastattistics .html United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). 2002. Whitson, Sarah Leah . 1992 . Neither Fish, Nor Flesh, Nor Good Red Herring: Lok Adalats: An Experiment in Informal Dispute Resolution in India, 15 HASTINGS INTERNATIONAL AND COMPARATIVE LAW REVIEW 391 . World Resources Institute, Indicators, http://earthtrends .wri .org; World Bank . 2006 . Report No . 35362- AO Angola Country Economic Memorandum: Oil, Broad-Based Growth, and Equity . Africa Region Macroeconomics . DRAFT The World Bank, 2004 . LITTLE DATA BOOK (Washington DC: The World Bank) . World Bank, 2003 . LAND POLICIES FOR GROWTH AND POVERTY REDUCTION (Washington DC: The World Bank) Rural Development Institute’s Report #125 | Women’s land rights in post-conflict angola | 21

Recent Reports in the RDI Series #124 managing Nepal’s Forests for Equitable and Sustainable Access and Use: A Land Tenure Perspective robin Nielsen (December 2008) #123 les Droits des femmes en matière foncière au Rwanda: Comment peuvent-ils être protége et renforcé au moment de la mise en œuvre de la Loi foncière? Jennifer Brown Justine Uvuza (Septembre 2006) #122 productivity of Intensively Used Homestead Plots in a Central Javan Village Robert Mitchell, Roy L. Prosteramn and Akhmad Safik (October 2006) #121 from Sharecroppers to Landowners: Paving the Way for West Bengal’s Bargadars robin Nielsen and Tim Hanstad (June 2004) #120 ejidos and Comunidades in Oaxaca, Mexico: Impact of the 1992 Reforms Jennifer Brown (February 2004) #119 the Impact of Land Titling in Ukraine: An Examination of the Results from an 800 Person Random-Sample Survey leonard Rolfes, Jr . (December 2003) #118 Amending the West Bengal Land Reforms Act: Benefiting the Poor and the Marginalized tim Hanstad and Jennifer Brown (May 2003) #117 land Reform in the 21st Century: New Challenges, New Responses roy l . Prosterman and Tim Hanstad (March 2003)

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