Zimbabwe Human Rights NGO Forum Special Report Gender and Constitutional Issues 2. Women have a right to employment in all sectors of the economy and to work in an environment free of sexual harassment and must fully participate in employment, including rights of advancement and promotion. 3. All women have a right to maternity benefits provided by the State and the employer. 4. Women must in their own rights have equality of access to credit and other facilities to ensure their full participation in the economic life of the nation with special schemes being established for them by Government. 5. Women must have equality of rights to own, acquire and utilise agricultural, residential and industrial land on the same basis as men. 6. Married persons must be deemed to have joint title and rights to land and housing acquired by them. 7. Women must retain rights over the product of their work, to control their own incomes and the sale of the produce from their labour. 8. Government must institute a gender-balanced, transparent, financially-supported land resettlement programme. Such programmes must be supported by adequate information and support to enable women to apply for and obtain resettlement land. 9. The State must ensure the preservation of national and natural resources and must create and protect a clean and healthy environment. 10. Resources must be managed by the State and local communities so as to ensure that local communities and individuals benefit from those resources. Local resource utilisation must be designed, wherever possible, to enhance local economic employment and financial opportunities. 11. Access to clean water, adequate and safe sanitation provisions must be available to all citizens regardless of where they live in Zimbabwe. CULTURE AND RELIGION Cultural and religious practices that discriminate against women, either directly or indirectly, must be abolished. Women must have full and free self-determination. Cultural and religious practices that deny or fetter women’s rights to such self-determination must be treated as unenforceable and every measure taken to ensure that they are abolished or suitably modified to eliminate such discrimination. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. All cultural and religious practices that discriminate against women, whether in the public or private sphere, must be eliminated by active legal, social and educational measures that are fully supported and funded by the State. The State must take measures to ensure that all forms of marriage, including unregistered customary marriages, are given equal recognition and confer equal rights on the parties to that marriage. Women must have the right to freely choose their marriage partners. Partners to a marriage must be granted equality of rights in matters regarding the marriage or the family that is produced from that marriage. Women must have equality of access to matrimonial property with men, regardless of the form of marriage and whether under general or customary law. Lobola/roora must be regulated so as to ensure that it is not used to oppress women, it should be regarded as no more than a token of the relationship between two families and should have no bearing or influence on the rights of the spouses to a marriage to any rights or entitlements that may accrue within that marriage. Women, where lobola/roora is exchanged between families must, as the mothers and nurturers of the bride be entitled to an equal share of the lobola/roora to that of the fathers of the bride. Women must have the right to participate fully in the cultural, artistic and sporting life and the nation regardless of their cultural, ethnic or religious backgrounds. The State has an obligation to ensure that women with disabilities are afforded every opportunity to enjoy their womanhood, including educational rights and the right to participate in cultural and sporting activities of their choice. Women must have free choice over matters of reproduction and the regulation of their fertility regardless of religious, cultural or ethnic considerations, this right of choice and the right to a family must be especially protected and advanced for women with disabilities. 21