Women Land Rights Movement (WLRM) is challenged to make the land rights activities practical, felt and physically seen if they are to achieve the desired goals of a woman owning 30% of registered land by 2025.
In a revival meeting in Kampala, the WLRM realized that they need to rekindle the fire of working together to empower themselves and ensure that every woman exercise’s her rights to own land, whether in or out of marriage and as well their ancestral or family land and property.
The Program Coordinator Landnet Uganda, Rebecca Apio noted that because the majority of the rural women are affected most, abused, forced into divorce and suffering domestic violence, the WLRM movement wants the legal reforms in the National Land Policy translated to allow all women understand and conform to the National Land Policy Legislations.
70% of women in Uganda are engaged in agriculture, the backbone of the country’s national economy’ but these seem not to be recognized for their wonderful effort. But for the WLRM to benefit, they need to be practical in their activities. “We are promoting efforts to ensure that the women’s land rights agenda is made practical if we are to achieve the desired goal”. Says Agnes Kirabo the Executive Director Food Rights Alliance.
The women work hard for the growth of the country’s economy through agriculture, unfortunately their efforts seem not to be realized given the fact that 70% of them are in agriculture. Frances Birungi Odong of UCOBAC says women till land, which they do not own, to grow crops and harvest them, but on the sad not, the men take control of the harvest”. Only less than 20% of women have control over their agricultural output.
One of the achievements that the women feel have successfully secured is the National Land Policy, but what remains is the translation of the legal reforms to allow women understand and conform to the national land policy legislations.
The Ministry of Lands also recognizes that women actually own less than 20% of the land on which they work with lots of stiff challenges. According to Denis Obbo of the Ministry of Lands, women have faced such challenges because they are still ignorant of the laws and policies that have failed them to participate effectively in land matters.
