UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Over 2.5 billion women and girls around the world are affected by discriminatory laws and the lack of legal protections, often in multiple ways. The spaces in which laws have been designed, implemented or even studied as a profession have historically excluded women and girls. As a result, their voices and perspectives continue to be largely absent from laws and legal practices. Discrimination in law is commonplace, including different standards for women and men in applying for a passport, choosing employment, transferring nationality to a child or foreign spouse, participating in court proceedings, receiving inheritance and deciding when and whom to marry. Laws that promote gender equality can yield multiple dividends: among other potential benefits, a law that enables women to inherit on an equal basis with men could empower mothers to invest in the education of their daughters. This increases women’s average age of marriage, because girls who stay in school are less likely to be married off. On the other hand, lower levels of gender equality in national laws are associated with fewer girls enrolled in primary and secondary education, fewer women in skilled work, fewer women owning land, fewer women accessing financial and health services and more women facing domestic, family and sexual violence. Law reform more broadly, and the repeal or revision of discriminatory laws specifically, are inherent to the achievement of gender equality a requirement for realizing the transformative ambitions of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. They are also among the specific commitments of States enshrined in relevant international conventions and United Nations standards and norms. Yet progress in eliminating discriminatory laws has been uneven. In many cases, global, regional and national sources of support have not been fully harnessed to accelerate reforms. Key propellers have included the monitoring role of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW Committee), country visits of the United Nations Working Group on the issue of discrimination against women in law and in practice, the policies of regional and interregional bodies, statements of political will from national governments, ongoing investments in analysis of laws from a gender perspective, continued education of the judiciary on domestic application of international law, judicial activism in striking down unconstitutional or discriminatory laws, the active engagement of civil society organizations (CSOs), campaigns to galvanize awareness and the collection of data to track specific aspects of discriminatory laws. Against this background, UN Women, the African Union, the Commonwealth, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the Organization International de la Francophonie and Secretaría General Ibero-Americana have issued Equality in Law for Women and Girls by 2030: A Multi stakeholder Strategy for Accelerated Action as a roadmap for the elimination of laws that discriminate against women and girls. The strategy presented in Equality in Law for Women and Girls focuses on the repeal or revision of discriminatory laws as an important part of a broader legal reform agenda that supports the achievement of gender equality. In this broader context, it seeks to ensure the elimination of all discriminatory legislation by 2030. In line with the above, UN Women Tanzania intends to conduct a comprehensive legislative analysis from a gender perspective to provide an in-depth understanding of the current legal framework and the existence of gaps and discriminatory provisions, with the long-term vision of advocating for law reform to enact new laws or repeal or revise discriminatory legislation. The gender analysis will explore the vast spectrum of laws to assess their gender responsiveness and will highlight discriminatory provisions and gaps that would require to be repealed, amended or enactment through a law reform process. Gender-sensitive legislation assumes “the integration of a gender perspective into all components of the legislative process—design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation to achieve the ultimate objective of equality between women and men. The principle of equality and non-discrimination embodies the cognizance that human rights cannot be achieved without guaranteeing that women and men (boys and girls) enjoy full and equal rights, responsibilities and opportunities. This principle is enshrined in multiple international treaties and in the Constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania and various legislations. Although Tanzania is a signatory to Global and Regional human rights instruments, and has in place laws, policies and strategies to attain gender equality and equity, the principle of non-discrimination is often not respected, frequently in the area of marriage and women’s property rights. Both Tanzania Mainland and Zanzibar Constitutions declares equal rights of men and women, and equal access to social, economic and development opportunities. However, women especially poor women, girls, people with disabilities face a host of direct and indirect discrimination that marginalizes them from effectively participating in and benefiting from economic, social, legal and political developments in the country. This situation is a result of the deep-rooted cultural, structural, and systemic practice of unequal relations and gender disparities. Zanzibar Gender policy 2016 has included the strategy to ensure all gender related ratified conventions, declarations and protocols are mainstreamed in legal frameworks. Zanzibar Government is commit to create a conducive environment to ensure women’s access, ownership and control of factors of production, among them includes to ensure enforcement of laws and regulations to address issues of access, ownership and control of productive resources, also to develop and enforce by-laws at different levels of Local Government; to address gender based discrimination, violence and oppressions. Despite commitments that Tanzania has subscribed to globally, regionally and nationally, women continue to experience discrimination due to persistent social-cultural beliefs and practices. Discriminatory provisions are entailed in various statutory and customary laws, such as the Law of Marriage Act (1971), the Local Customary Law (Declaration Order) (1963), the Penal Code, the Citizenship Act (1995), inheritance laws and property laws, that are incompatible with internationally ratified Conventions. The multiple and contradictory legal frameworks (customary, religious and statutory) operating in tandem, leave room for discrimination and marginalization of women. Inconsistencies can also be found within the formal legal and policy frameworks. Legal instruments that should protect children against such practices are contradicted by others such as the Law of Marriage Act, of 1971 which allows marriage of boys at 18 and girls at the age of 15, with parental consent and 14 with Court consent. The legal analysis will look at discrimination in a broad sense – both on direct discrimination, namely, how the law explicitly treats women and men or girls and boys; and indirect discrimination that occurs when a law appears to be neutral on its face but has a discriminatory effect in practice on women because pre-existing inequalities are not addressed by the apparently neutral measure. The legal analysis will consist of a selective mapping of the national context for purposes of capturing all forms of legal frameworks (the constitution, statutes, legislative instruments, executive orders, administrative regulations, case law and other relevant and related government texts) and not only those which reference gender, women or girls. The legal frameworks in question will cover all fields and sectors of law and will not be limited to legislation that is specifically related to women, girls or children. Each legal text will be pre-assessed, and a determination made as to how the provisions impact upon the achievement of gender equality. The legal analysis will draw from international standards, such as the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the CEDAW Committee’s General Recommendation No. 28 on the Core Obligations of States Parties under Article 2 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. Concluding observations from the CEDAW Committee, Committee on the Rights of the Child and Universal Periodic Review will also be taken in consideration.
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