•Stakeholders like the Zambia Police Service have increased programmes aimed at sensitising the public against property grabbing.

By CHUSA SICHONE –

SAMANTHA Namukuma (not real name) lost her husband whom she had been married to for 20 years and with whom she bore three daughters.
Mr Namukuma, 50, was the breadwinner who, with support from his wife, ran a successful motor spare parts business which made his family qualify to be in the ‘well-to-do’ class.
Unfortunately, Mr Namukuma died aged 55 in a road traffic accident and as expected relatives and friends turned up en masse for the funeral.
However, after burial the deceased’s relatives went on rampage to ransack the bereaved family’s home, seeking to lay their hands on whatever property they could get.
They accused Mr Namukuma’s widow of bewitching her husband and warned to retaliate by bewitching her if she did not let them seize the property they believed entirely belonged to them.
The widow and her children watched helplessly at the turn of events which aggravated their anguish.
To make matters worse, Mr Namukuma died without leaving a Will (or Intestate) and therefore the widow felt it was pointless to fight for her property.Luckily enough, Mr Namukuma’s relatives did not pounce on the ATM card thus the bereaved family’s joint account was not tampered with.
It was this money that Mrs Namukuma used for her children’s education as well continuing running the family business.This is just one of the many unreported cases of property grabbing involving victims who suffer silently.
Unlike other families left shattered and destitute by property grabbing, the Namukumas were fortunate enough to pick up the pieces and start afresh.
Usually such property grabbing victims do not come out in the open to air their grievances either because they have nowhere to turn to for help or have no knowledge of the Intestate Succession Act of 1989 of the Laws of Zambia.
The Act clearly stipulates how the surviving spouse, children, deceased’s parents and dependents should share the deceased’s estate.
According to the Act, if a person dies without leaving a Will on disposing his estate, his wife is entitled to 20 percent of his estate, the same amount that is given to deceased’s parents.
The children get 50 per cent and 10 per cent goes to the dependents.
Chapter 60 of the Wills and Administration of Testate Estates Act of the Laws of Zambia, on the other hand, involves a person dying leaving a Will (or Testate).
A Will is a document written by a person containing instructions on how the estate should be dealt with upon that person’s death.
It becomes legally binding and enforceable only after the Testator dies.
It is a requirement that a Will be written in ink or any other permanent writing but not using a pencil.
A Will must be signed by the Testator and two witnesses in the presence of each other. It must be written by a person of sound mind aged 18 and above.
An illiterate or blind person can also write a Will by giving instructions to one who can write with transparency measures put in place.
Once written, it is advisable that the Will be kept in any safe place such as at church, bank where the Testator is a customer, the Testator’s personal file at work, with a lawyer or filed at the High Court Probate Registry.
The High Court has jurisdiction to deal with matters relating to Wills and whoever goes against a Will should be reported to the police to be prosecuted.
Zambia Police Service Victim Support Unit (VSU) National Coordinator Tresford Kasale was happy to note that property grabbing cases in the country are reducing as compared to 10 years ago when they were more rampant than other cases the VSU deals with.
Senior Superintendent Kasale said last year, 15,153 Gender-Based Violence (GBV) cases were recorded and out of that 302 were property grabbing cases.
‘’14, 097 GBV cases were recorded in 2013 and of that total, 319 were cases of depriving rightful beneficiaries of their entitlements (property grabbing).These cases (property grabbing) are reducing compared to 10 years ago and to us it’s a plus, we are winning this battle. Our hope is to reduce property grabbing cases to zero,” Mr Kasale said.
Mr Kasale attributed the reduction in property grabbing cases to among others reasons awareness, improvement in the economy, people becoming content with whatever they have and stringent measures Government has put in place to ensure that disbursement of the deceased’s persons benefits go to the rightful beneficiaries.
Superintendent Kasale said some property grabbers were resorting to that action not because they did not have the items they were seizing but were merely doing so to avenge what they perceived to be unpalatable conduct by the widow towards them while the husband was alive.
Mr Kasale warned that property grabbing is an offence and culprits risk being sentenced for up to two years in prison as stipulated in the Intestate Succession Act.
He urged people to desist from eyeing other people’s property but should instead work hard so that they acquire their own.
Mr Kasale further advised property grabbing victims to report the perpetrators to the nearest police station so that the culprits are prosecuted.
Justice for Widows and Orphans Project (JWOP), a network of organisation, was formed by seven members to fight against violation of rights for widows and orphans in Zambia.
Besides VSU, the other member organisation encompassed by JWOP is the National Legal Aid Clinic for Women (NLACW).
NLACW was established in 1990 as a project under the Law Association of Zambia’s Women’s Rights Committee (WRC).
The project was formed to provide affordable legal aid to women and children from marginalized social sectors and helps women and children who cannot afford the normal legal costs to hire a lawyer to represent them in their quest for justice.
The organisation works to help women, youth and children who have been victims of social injustice and prevent the decrease in their quality of life.
The Clinic comes in handy through legal redress, arbitration, mediation and advocacy via law reform.
Property grabbing is one of the issues the NLACW tackles and the posters stuck on its reception wall say it all: “Property grabbing is a crime”.
With this awareness, people should be made to understand that not only is it a crime for one to grab property they did not work for. Property grabbing is tantamount to stealing from the bereaved persons!