Geneva,
8 March 2008: Governments must take active steps to protect the rights
of women to housing and land, and integrate these protections into their
strategies to ameliorate the negative effects of the global HIV/AIDS
pandemic, according to the Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and
Evictions (COHRE).
Jean du Plessis, Deputy Director of COHRE, said “The
statistics are nothing short of alarming. In Africa, 58% of those infected
with HIV/AIDS are female and 68% of all youth infected with HIV/AIDS are
female. Because the HIV/AIDS pandemic is fuelled in part by systems of gender
discrimination and inequality, the international community has come to
acknowledge improving the status of women is a critical task in the fight
against HIV/AIDS.”
Mayra Gómez, COHRE’s Women and Housing Rights Programme
Coordinator, said “For women affected by the AIDS pandemic, housing rights
are intimately connected to their security, health, and wellbeing. If they
are unable to fully enjoy their housing rights, women cannot be the
architects of their own destiny, they cannot exercise true independence, and
they become vulnerable to a myriad other human rights violations.”
Through previous research and advocacy, COHRE has shown that
when women’s housing rights are respected and protected – including when
women and girls are able to inherit and control housing, land and property –
women and girls are better able to cope with the detrimental effects of
HIV/AIDS. Because housing within a secure community leads to better living
conditions, access to livelihood, community and health services, and access
to education, women and girls are often better able to mitigate the negative
personal and financial impact of HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, a secure home and all
that comes with it enhances personal autonomy and reduces many of the risk
factors associated with HIV/AIDS. Critically, for women, the realisation of
housing and land rights may actually prevent HIV/AIDS transmission in certain
cases by reducing dependency and enhancing personal autonomy.
Women traditionally carry the multiple burdens of being care
givers, house keepers and income generators. Yet, women are rarely given
independent rights to the housing they live in or the land they farm, as it
is often accessed either formally or informally through their relationship
with a male. Women across the world who suffer the loss of their husbands due
to AIDS risk losing their marital homes and being left utterly destitute.
Gómez said “A woman can easily be forcibly evicted from her
home or land at any time, often without any recourse whatsoever. Securing
women’s rights to housing and land is fundamental to improving women’s
status, and their lives. Without independent rights to adequate housing and
land, women remain precariously dependent on males and susceptible to lives
of insecurity, abuse and exploitation. The result of this situation is a
precarious state of limbo for millions of individual women confronted by HIV
and AIDS.”
Gómez added, “In order to address the housing rights
violations which women and girls affected by HIV and AIDS experience, it must
also be understood that those violations are not only rooted in unjust
systems of poverty and social neglect, they are also deeply rooted in systems
of gender-based oppression which must themselves be challenged and put
right.”
Du Plessis said: “COHRE calls on all governments to urgently
reassess the housing and land rights situation of all women in their country,
and to put in place bold policy, law and implementation programmes aimed at
advancing these rights.”
For interviews or additional information please contact:
Dr. Mayra Gómez
Coordinator, COHRE Women and Housing Rights Programme
Telephone: +1-218-7331370
Email: mayra@cohre.org
or media@cohre.org
