PARLIAMENT - Cabinet has approved an amendment to the Recognition of Customary Marriages Act (RCMA) which will give women who entered into monogamous and polygamous customary marriages prior to 1998 equal rights to marital property, Presidency Minister Jackson Mthembu said on Thursday.
Briefing the media on the outcomes of Wednesday's fortnightly cabinet meeting, Mthembu said the bill, which provides for the equal treatment of women in customary marriages, will be tabled in Parliament this year.
"The amendments eliminate the gender-based discrimination in polygamous marriages entered into before the commencement of the RCMA of 1998," he said.
"Spouses will now have joint and equal proprietary rights over marital property."
The bill is in compliance with a 2018 Constitutional Court order which declared the original act invalid. The court gave Parliament two years to remedy the law's defects and discriminatory clauses.