IGAD TO ADVANCE WOMEN’S RIGHT TO LAND TENURE

IGAD to advance women’s right to land tenure . PHOTO/ VERA SHAWIZA

IGAD to Advance Women’s Rights to Land Tenure

By Vera Shawiza

The Intergovernmental Authority on

Development (IGAD) endorsed the R

egional Women’s Land Rights Agenda in a

bid to support the implementation of

the AU Declaration on Land Issues and

Challenges in Africa toward The Africa

We Want and Leaving No One Behind.

This is a culmination of the convention

of the Ministerial meeting for the

Ministers responsible for Land and

Ministers responsible for Gender/Women

Affairs in the IGAD member states,

preceded by a Directors’. To move the

gender

equality on land forward from a

regional perspective, the Directors’

meeting will draw common threads from

the National Women’s Land Rights Agenda

for the seven (7) Member States and

the recommendations from the IGAD

Regional Women’s Land Rights Conference

into the IGAD Region Women’s Land

Rights Agenda.

The Regional Women’s Land Rights Agenda

is a framework document that will

enable the IGAD Secretariat to provide

the necessary support to the Member

States in implementing gender and land

projects for the next 10 years.

Cabinet Secretary in the Ministry of

Lands Farida Karoney said the AU

Framework and Guidelines for land

policy in Africa calls for individual

member states to cooperate at regional

levels to address land issues and

challenges through comprehensive

people-driven land policies and reforms

in which women’s rights to land are

ingrained.

“The Ministry of Lands and Physical

Planning, in collaboration with IGAD,

has held consultative meetings with key

stakeholders to draw out Kenya Women’s

Land Rights Agenda. Consensus building

has been done on outstanding Women

Land Rights challenges and

prioritisation of the key Issues.”

The IGAD Regional Women’s Land Rights

Agenda is operational, enabling the

implementation of Gender Equality

programs on land by the IGAD

Secretariat and its IGAD Member States;

Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, South Sudan,

Djibouti, Somalia and Ethiopia.

A Communiqué was issued at the closing

of the ministerial meeting.

IGAD on 28 – 30 June 2021 held its

first ever

Regional Women’s Land Rights Conference

that brought to bear the transnational

and intergenerational connectedness of

women’s rights to land. Statements of

commitment were received from the

highest representatives of Government

in the Ministries responsible for Lands

and the Ministries responsible for

Gender/Women Affairs of each of the

IGAD Member States.

The IGAD Land Governance Programme is

supported by the Swiss Agency for

Development and Cooperation (SDC) and

the Embassy of Sweden in Addis Ababa

The AU Declaration on Land Issues and

Challenges gives mandate to IGAD to

provide technical guidance to the

member countries, monitor land sectors’

progress, and promote regional land

policy harmonization and women’s land

rights.

The same Declaration gives mandate to

member states to promote land sector

interventions that tackle underlying

causes of tenure insecurity including

through securing and protecting all

tenure rights, increasing transparency

in land administration, and promoting

equal access to land for all land

users.

It is on this basis that IGAD, through

the IGAD Land Unit has worked on

progressively crafting a strategic

framework for its operations. The

starting point was to help Member

states assess common and shared land

tenure challenges.

For Gender Equality on land, the work

commenced in 2020 with conducting

gender assessments of the land sector

in each of the IGAD Member States, with

the aim of identification not only of

issues for national attention, but the

transnational land governance issues

and draw recommendations that

strengthen regional integration through

convergence.

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