Activists, Community Stakeholders, Women Hail Rivers New Inheritance Law

Prominent civil rights activist, Stephanie Ekpebulu, has hailed the enactment of the Female Inheritance Law in Rivers State, urging women, especially in rural communities, to take advantage of the new law and assert their rights to their legal and legitimate rights in their communities.
Governor Nyesom Wike had recently assented to the Female Inheritance Law, which was passed earlier in the year by the House of Assembly.
Ekpebulu who is a lawyer, said both the Bible and the Supreme Court endorsed the right of women to inherit their father’s property and the new law has come to put a legal backing to that right.
She said old traditions that denied women their rights to inherit property should now be dispensed with and new laws and court judgments recognizing women’s rights to inheritance and personal dignity adopted.
Vice-Chairperson of Eleme Local Government, Mrs. Virtue Ekee, said the local government was disposed to implementing the new law, and advised women not to give up now that the law is on their side.
Similarly, Nigeria Association of Women Journalists (NAWOJ) Rivers State Chapter has commended the governor for signing “The Rivers State Prohibition of The Curtailment of Women’s Right to Share in Family Property Law No. 2 of 2022,” saying the new law will enable women to actualize their potential.
The association’s reaction, which was signed by the chairperson, Mrs. Susan Serekara-Nwikhana, and the secretary, Dr. Ngozi Anosike, said it was heartwarming that women in the state would now be entitled by law to inherit from their families. ,
NAWOJ wondered why many cultures did not encourage what could lead to the growth of women in society, and said the coming into force of the new law will mark a new dawn in the state.
NAWOJ further expressed delight that female children who the body said are more useful members of the society, will no longer be deprived from sharing of the inheritance of their families and promised to educate women in the rural areas on their rights to inherit what belongs to their fathers.
Also reacting to the enactment of the law, the running-mate to the governorship candidate of the African Alliance Congress (AAC) in Rivers State, Dr. Ivy West said the new law was long overdue and called on women to henceforth stand up for their rights and challenge any discrimination against them in court.
“The new law is a welcome development, but coming a little too long considering the deprivation and ignominy that women have had to suffer on account of a denial of their right to inheritance,” she added.
She said female children were not second class citizens and should not be treated like one. “Families should put the judgment in practice and women should stand up and claim their rights. This new law is backed by a Supreme Court judgment. It is also your God-given right as a woman,” West said.
An Eleme historian, Mr. Samuel Onungwe, said the good side of the law is that it has gone beyond native law and customs to legalize and where it so applies, assets such as land, building can be issued to female children at the passing of their parent or guardian.
“It behooves on the Eleme traditional rulership to domestic this law such that proper interpretation, apportionment and application is done to prevent some uncivilized male family members from perpetrating evil when things favour the female more.”