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Hope for Tanzanian Widows Initiative

Legal aid for preventing tomorrow’s poverty through legal wills today

The Problem: Destitute Widows

In the customary practices of many patrilineal societies in Tanzania, a grieving widow is often stripped of her material possessions by her in-laws.[1] She is evicted from her home and the land that she shared with her husband and where she raised their children. Typically, the in-laws also take any assets used for income generation for the family. Now, a widow—often with children—lives in destitute poverty.

 

Thus, a UN report indicates that poverty levels among the widows in Africa
are the highest in society.[2]

  • “African widows, irrespective of ethnic groups, are among the most vulnerable and destitute women in the region… The low status, poverty and violence experienced by widows stem from discrimination in inheritance custom, the patriarchal nature of society, and the domination of oppressive traditional practices and customary codes, which take precedence over constitutional guarantees of equality, modern laws and international women’s human rights standards.”[3]
  • Tamara Ezra states, “Both customary and Islamic law, the two predominant systems of intestate succession in Tanzania, limit women’s inheritance on the basis of their gender. Under customary law, a widow is generally denied inheritance altogether…Tanzania’s [customary] inheritance laws thus impoverish women and leave their survival at the mercy of men.”[4]

     

    Dr. Elieshi Mungure of Tumaini University Makumira summarizes,

    “The African widow traditionally still remains handicapped
    in terms of finance and property inheritance.”
    [5]

     

Vision

Hope for Tanzanian Widows envisions a future of well-being for widows, shielded from predatory in-laws through legally binding wills that protects their homes and assets, thus reducing destitute widowhood.

Mission

Preventing widows from experiencing destitute poverty through legal wills

Core Values

  • Biblical mandate to care for the widow and fatherless
  • Compassion for vulnerable widows and their children
  • Prevention of destitute widowhood through legal wills
  • Upholding Tanzanian laws in support of justice for widows
  • Human rights with the equality of men and women
  • Leveraging church and community networks for preventing destitute widowhood through legal wills and/or agreements of joint ownership of property

The Project Summary

The project’s mission is to prevent poverty through equipping households with legal documents that protect widows in accordance with Tanzanian laws. Dissemination of legal aid is targeted through assistance by law students and seeking to leverage the established church, mosque, and community structures.

Main Strategies for Preventing Poverty

  1. Providing free will templates and legal aid information online.
  2. Providing legal aid to develop legal wills and agreements for joint ownership of property.
  3. Providing biblical teaching for church leaders to counteract cultural taboos against writing wills.
  4. Equipping law students to provide legal aid in home churches and communities through mini-legal aid internships.
  5. Providing will-writing resources and legal aid to pastors and church leaders.
  6. Writing articles for church publications and media to promote the importance of legal wills and inform of free resources.

Leaders

  • Dr. Daniel Pallangyo, LL.D., The Faculty of Law at Tumaini University Makumira, Usa River, Tanzania.
    • The long-term sustainability of this project is undergirded by passion. Dan is the son of a widow. He saw his widowed mother suffer injustice because of predatory in-laws, which he says was significant in shaping his vocation to be a lawyer.
    • He is providing his oversight of this widow’s project pro bono.
  • Dr. Beth Elness-Hanson, Associate Professor of Biblical Studies, Wartburg Theological Seminary, USA, on leave of absence for a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellowship, located in Tanzania.
    • Beth is a former volunteer teacher (2002–2004) in Tanzania.
    • Beth is a brain cancer widow (since 2010).
    • Beth co-wrote a paper (expected publishing in 2025) with Rev. Prof. Dr. Hoyce Jacob Lyimo-Mbowe on widowhood in Tanzania, which initiated this collaboration with Dan.
    • Beth and Hoyce have written biblical teaching for the pastors in Tanzania to counteract the cultural taboos on writing wills.

Free Will Template and Information

Information to fill out the form (Kiswahili)
fomu ya WOSIA WILL-1.pdf
Adobe Acrobat document [203.1 KB]
Free fillable form for a legal will (Kiswahili).doc
WOSIA WILL SAMPLE (2024).docx
Microsoft Word document [21.4 KB]
Free fillable form for a legal will (Kiswahili) in RTF format
WOSIA WILL SAMPLE (2024) RTF.rtf
Text document [91.6 KB]

Resources

[1] Bethany Brown, “‘You Will Get Nothing’: Violations of Property and Inheritance Rights of Widows in Zimbabwe,” Human Rights Watch, January 24, 2017, https://www.hrw.org/report/2017/01/24/you-will-get-nothing/violations-property-and-inheritance-rights-widows-zimbabwe. According to this report, in a contemporary African society, it is a common trend for widows to be victimized by stripping off their property and land assets following the death of their husbands.

[2] “Widowhood: Invisible Women, Secluded or Excluded in Women,” Women 2000: United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women, December 2001, 8, 11

[3] “Widowhood: Invisible Women, Secluded or Excluded in Women.” Women 2000: United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women, December 2001, 20.

[4] Tamar Ezer, “Inheritance Law in Tanzania: The Impoverishment of Widows and Daughters,” The Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law VII, no. 599 (2006): 601.

[5] Elieshi Mungure, “Widowhood: An Experience of Loss from an African Patriarchal Society” (Master’s Thesis, Dubuque, IA, Wartburg Theological Seminary, 2000), 150.

OVERVIEW

I teach Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and intercultural hermeneutics at Wartburg Theological Seminary, (on leave of absence) Dubuque, IA, USA, and VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway. Through VID, I am currently engaging a postdoctoral research project with the Maasai in Tanzania.