The coalition handed
over its proposals to the government at a workshop to that effect in Yaounde on
Wednesday July 8.
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| Participants at the worksho (credit RRI) |
The position document,
handed over to government focuses on collective tenure rights and calls for
recognizing and securing the rights of Cameroon’s indigenous peoples. It also
emphasizes the importance of recognizing the village as a legal entity and
establishing collective property rights, and calls for equal land access for
women.
According to Mary
Nyuyinwi, RRI facilitator for Central Africa and Liberia, the coalition has
been involved with the land reform process in Cameroon ever since president
Biya announced the reforms at the Ebolowa agro pastoral show in 2011.
“Since then, the
Coalition has met with various stakeholders to ensure their interests are taken
into account and conducted targeted advocacy to promote the rights of
indigenous peoples and local communities, as well as women and other vulnerable
groups in the country, in the land law”.
The 1974 land tenure
legislation according to the coalition does not different differentiate urban
from rural land. More so, the law does not give women and other vulnerable
groups in Cameroon the right to own land.
The coalition has
proposed amongst others that married women should jointly own land with their
husbands and the recognition of the validity of local customs and the role of
local institutions, within the limits of each village’s collective property.
The workshop brought
together members of the civil society, non-governmental organizations and the
administration.
The inspector general in the Ministry of State
Property, Surveys, and Land Tenure lauded the coalition’s initiative promising
the government will consider the proposals.
By Ndi Eugene Ndi
