Women in Chad defy discrimination and violence to assert their rights to own and control land

abcnews.go.com:

Many women in the central African nation of Chad are excluded from owning or having a say over the land they spend long hours working

BINMAR, Chad — When Milla Nemoudji, a 28-year-old from a village in southern Chad, divorced her husband following years of physical abuse, she found herself without means for survival. Though raised in a farming family, she struggled to get by in a community where access to land is customarily controlled by men.

With little support for women in her situation, divorce being relatively rare in Chad, she fought for economic independence. She sold fruits and other goods. During the rainy season, she plowed fields as a laborer. Last year, however, a women’s collective arrived in her village and she decided to join, finally gaining access to land and a say over its use. She farmed cotton, peanuts and sesame, making enough money to cover basic needs.

The village, Binmar, is on the outskirts of Chad’s second-largest city, Moundou, in the densely populated Logone Occidental region. Thatched-roof homes stand amid fields where women traditionally harvest the land but, like Nemoudji, have little or no say over it.

In Chad, land access is often controlled by village chiefs who require annual payments. Women are often excluded from land ownership and inheritance, leaving them dependent on male relatives and reinforcing their secondary status in society.

The struggle for land rights is compounded by the dual legal system in Chad where customary law often supersedes statutory law, especially in rural areas. While recent legal reforms mean laws recognize the right of any citizen to own land, application of those laws is inconsistent.

For women like Nemoudji who seek to assert their rights, the response