(MENAFN- The Post)
Elsewhere in this issue we carry a story of how Lesotho's MPs are now in a stampede to pass a raft of laws in an attempt to unlock millions of dollars in funding for development projects.
The United States government last year said it would not release the funds unless Lesotho passes into law the Administration of Estates and Inheritance Bill and the Labour Bill by the end of this month.
With just two weeks before the March 31 deadline, Lesotho's MPs have now found themselves in a squeeze.
A delegation from the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) was in Lesotho last week to check on progress.
The stampede by MPs to act comes only after the US government threatened to crack the whip by withholding funding.
One of the key demands is for Lesotho to pass the Administration of Estates and Inheritance Bill that will likely improve the welfare of women and the girl child in Lesotho.
For decades, women and girls were at the receiving end of discriminatory practices simply because they were women.
They could not inherit their parents' wealth, with the customary law favouring sons. Women could not even succeed their fathers under the Lesotho chieftainship law.
The customary laws were patently discriminatory.
We can think of the long running legal wrangle involving Senate Masupha who was the first born child of the late Principal Chief Gabasheane Masupha and first wife Chieftainess 'Masenate Masupha.
Senate argued that a section of the Chieftainship Act denied her the right to succeed to the chieftainship solely on the basis of her gender.
She subsequently lost the case in the Constitutional Court.
The judgment was a devastating blow for the emancipation of women and confirmed that we remained stuck to our patriarchal ways of doing things.
Our courts had over the years backed the discriminatory customary laws by denying the girl child their inheritance.
The Administration of Estates and Inheritance Bill, tabled by Justice Minister Nthomeng Majara, will undo some of this damage. It will abolish a customary law which made males the only heirs of their parents' late estate.
The law, once enacted, will introduce the female child as an heir even where she has brothers. However, it will leave customary chieftainship inheritance laws untouched.
The law will also introduce the giving out of inheritance to children born out of wedlock when their father dies.
We believe this is a progressive law that was long overdue.
Our question is simple: Did we have to wait for the Americans to nudge us to do the right thing? Couldn't we have thought of this on our own and implemented it without the US holding a gun over our heads?
Now MPs are under pressure to deliver. If they don't Lesotho risks losing massive funding that could have been used for development projects.
It is a law that will likely correct a historical injustice against women.
Our simple position is that it was never fair nor just to deny women their inheritance based on their gender. This is a practice that should have been reviewed a long time ago.
Once enacted into law, the government must go on an aggressive education and information campaign to educate the people about the change of law.
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