TWO gender advocacy groups have expressed concern over what they described as the delay in the passage of the Intestate Succession Bill by parliament.
The two, the African Women Lawyers Association (AWLA) and the Leadership and Advocacy for Women in Africa (LAWA Ghana) maintained that the passage of the bill had been delayed because some of the parliamentarians do not fully appreciate the concerns of women as capture under the lay.
They have therefore urged Parliament, to as a matter of urgency, pass the bill without further delay, since the House was due to rise soon.
The bill which was first laid in parliament in 2009 for the first reading is at the Consideration Stage.
It is intended to address shortfalls in the Intestate Succession Law, 1985, which has been in operation for more than 26 years.
Last month, parliament called on the general public to make an input into the Intestate Succession Bill, to enable it to come out with a law that will eliminate the anomalies in the present PNDC Law 111 relating to Intestate Succession.
The House made the call at a press conference addressed by the Deputy Majority Leader, Alhaji Rashid Pelpuo, the Minority Leader, Mr Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, and the Chairman of the Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee, Mr Emmanuel Kwasi Bandua.
Addressing a press conference to re-echo the need for the early passage of the bill, the Executive Director of LAWA, Ms Shiela Minkah-Premo indicated that in spite of the fact that the Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee of Parliament and other stakeholders have completed a nation-wide public educational campaign to sensitise the public to the provisions of the bill and collated imputs from the public, the passage of the bill continues to be delayed, and accused members of the committee of "attempting to put negative views and barriers in the minds of people on the provisions of this progressive law”.
“There appears to be a trend in Parliament where there is a reluctance to enact any Bill that has gender undertones”, and mentioned the domestic Violence Bill, which was passed into law in 2007, as an example.
According to her, development partners such as Star Ghana, the United Nations Development Fund (UNDP), who have been involved in the funding of the consultative processes, need to see positive results and that would only happen when the bill is passed.
The Executive Director of AWLA, Ms Edna Kuma said owing to a lot of women not being informed about their rights, there was the need to put in place the necessary mechanisms that would ensure an adequate protection regime for them.
The Chief Director of the Ministry of Women’s and Children’s Affairs (MOWAC), Mr Gershong Kumor, also reiterated the concerns of the two groups, and said there was the need to pass the bill before the general elections in December.
Last month, parliament called on the general public to make an input into the Intestate Succession Bill, which is currently before it to enable it to come out with a law that will eliminate the anomalies in the present PNDC Law 111 relating to Intestate Succession, which was enacted 26 years ago.
But some of the provisions of the PNDCL 111 have in their current state proved inimical to the interest of the immediate family of people who die intestate.
The bill has been in Parliament for the past three years and a lot of public inputs had been sought to make the eventual law a solid one because both the Majority and the Minority sides of the House were unanimous that a better law would be passed if the public was allowed to make additional inputs.
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