Recommendations To the Government of Zimbabwe and the Parliament of Zimbabwe: • Commit to implementation of the constitution and national laws for widows’ equal inheritance rights by amending laws and regulations and repealing all laws that violate women’s property rights under domestic or international standards, including African standards. • Put in place a system to ensure all existing and new marriages, including customary unions, are officially registered in a central registry with digital records that are accessible throughout the country as proof of marriage. • Allow the posthumous recognition of marriages and customary unions with witness accounts of the rituals or other means to confirm the marriage. • Engage in public awareness campaigns to counter unlawful property grabbing, to encourage (not compel) marriage registration, and to inform widows of their inheritance rights. • Ensure widows, including those in rural communities, have meaningful access to legal remedies in cases of property or inheritance grabbing. • Provide information on the economic consequences of the marital relationship and of its potential dissolution by divorce or death to those seeking any form of marriage. • Convene a commission to review guidelines for penalties for unlawful property grabbing to ensure that punishments are proportionate and to ensure enforcement. • Remove references to lobola or marriage consideration in civil laws. • Ratify the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Older Persons in Africa. • Resume regular human rights reports to the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, addressing widows’ property rights. • Join the African Court of Human and Peoples’ Rights and permit individuals to bring cases there. 49 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH | JANUARY 2017