In normal African setting, girls are not allowed to inherit their parent’s properties.
However, six sisters whom had sued their brothers who had denied them a piece of their late father’s inheritance won the case.
The six sisters who won a landmark inheritance case against their brothers have received title deeds for part of the 42 acres piece of land left behind by their father.
On Friday officials from the ministry of land gave the sisters deeds showing that they will each own five acres of the land.
The sisters from Cheborgei village in Bureti constituency, shed tears of joy as they sang and danced their way to receive the deeds from Pauline Muriithia, the Deputy land registrar.
The occasion was witnessed by a group of women rights crusaders from across the country.
The 42-acre piece of land originally belonged to sisters’ father, Joel Korir who died in 2012. The two brother who had challenged their sisters’ right to inherit the land will share 12 acres of the land.
.On July 24 last year, Justice Mumbi Ngugi ruled that in relation to the estate of the Joel Cheruiyot Korir, the six women to inherit the property left behind by their father.
“Until today, I did not have any space to build a house or to plant food crops to feed my family but today words cannot express my joy after the government issued me with a title deed,” said 72-years old Rachael Korir, who had filed the suit.
The mother of eight children explained the she had been forced to move to court after elders sat more than 20 times but couldn’t convince her brothers to allow her to inherit her father’s land.
“I did not move to court because I wanted but because I was forced to. The elders did not help. I had asked for my brothers to only allow me to settle on a half an acre of the land but they flatly refused. I was really disappointed,” said Ms Korir.
Karoney, added that it was important to apply affirmative action approaches to enhance the inclusivity of more women in all levels I the economy.
“This will go a long way to improve the economic wellbeing of many households,” she said.
Naomi Lanoi from the Kenya Land Alliance (KLA) argued that even where land reform provides gender equality in line with the Sustainable Development Goal Number Five, implementation was slow and biased towards men dominance.
“The lack of serious attention to gender equality reinforces the marginalised position of women and undermines mainstreaming efforts to improve women’s land rights. It also hampers, broadly government and society strategies for economic development,” she said.
The case of the six sisters reflected the de facto existence of a system of statutory law alongside indigenous customary practices in many counties, which allows men to manoeuvre from strict adherence to rule of law as provided by the Constitution and successive land laws.