Masters Dissertation

Zimbabwe has made commitments – global, regional and national – towards the fulfilment of the right to maternal health care by ratifying several international conventions and other regional instruments. According to the Magistrate who writes this dissertation, whilst such commitments are commendable and a significant step toward achieving this goal, for rural women in Romsley […]

In the Lindi Region of Tanzania (and possibly throughout the whole of Tanzania), victims of rape, the general public and the majority of legal service providers are almost completely unaware of the provision of section 131(1) of the Penal Code which imposes a duty on presiding judicial officers to order convicted rapists to pay their […]

This dissertation, written by a former policeman who headed Zambia’s VSU (Victim Support Unit), investigates the plight of female (i.e., women and girls) sexual assault survivors who risk contracting the deadly HIV/AIDS virus, largely because the State, through its silence (i.e., lack of policy, legislation or administrative measures), fails to inform them of potentially life-saving […]

This research seeks to reduce the incidence of the serious gender-based crime of domestic violence (DV), perpetrated most commonly by men against women, by proposing various recommendations in order to effect improvements to the current unsatisfactory sentencing trends of judicial officers (particularly magistrates, the majority of whom are male) under the Domestic Violence Act which, […]

This dissertation investigates what political, legal, cultural and economic factors have caused the growing number of double orphans in Zimbabwe (the most vulnerable victims of the HIV/AIDS pandemic) to remain outside the protection of the general law of adoption and guardianship. Before Zimbabwe’s Independence from Britain in 1980, Rhodesian colonial legislation generally provided that the […]

The writer of this dissertation, a Magistrate, reveals that the failure of victims of rape and defilement (mainly women and girl children) to satisfy the requirements of the purported ‘rule’ (or practice or modus operandi) on corroboration is a   significant common reason why so many sexual assailants (mainly men) escape legal punishment. Tracing the […]

In terms of various binding and/or persuasive local, regional and international Human Rights instruments, it is the dream and the task of the Tanzanian government to provide social security to all its citizens, particularly to the majority of its citizens who are women, many of whom work in the informal sector. They are a particularly […]

The internally displaced persons (IDPs) phenomenon has been of increasing concern not only in Kenya but also to the international community due to their growing numbers and an increasing awareness of their vulnerability. The pernicious effects on those displaced are wide ranging and include impoverishment and exclusion from basic and social amenities like water, food, […]