Abantu for Development is a non-governmental organization (NGO) established in 1991 by African women based in Europe. It is a grassroots organization advocating for women rights, particularly for women’s land rights. The Regional Office for Western Africa (ROWA) is based in Accra and coordinates all Abantu programmes in the West African sub-region. In 2003, Abantu-ROWA initiated a research and advocacy programme that led to the creation a document known as The Women’s Manifesto for Ghana. The manifesto sets up a series of positions and requests on land reform; titling and registration process; representation of women in the land commission; transformation of customary tenure systems; equity in access to and control of land; guarantee of women’s inheritance rights (21). http://www.abantu-rowa.org/

The Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT) is a coalition of civil society organisations and individuals working to promote gender justice in economic and land policies. In 2008, NETRIGHT, after conducting broad consultations with women’s groups on a national level, issued a series of recommendations for the government to provide for equal access to ownership and to guide assistance to national policies that promote gender equality (29).

The country has a decentralized system of local government and administration system made up of a structure of Regional Coordinating Councils (RCC) and Municipal/District Assemblies (DAs).

The RCC is an administrative and coordinating rather than a political and policy-making body. Its functions are to: i. monitor, coordinate and evaluate the performance of the DAs in the region and coordinate public services generally in the region. RCCs are established for each of the 10 regions of the country.

The District Assembly is the administrative authority in the district and has deliberative, legislative and executive powers. The Assembly is responsible for the implementation of development policies and programmes coordinated by the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC). DAs are either metropolitan, municipal or district. The Assembly is composed of one person from each local government electoral area within the district elected by universal adult suffrage. No quotas within its membership are set aside for women representatives. There are 3 metropolitan assemblies, 4 municipal assemblies and 103 DAs (27).

The Regional Houses of Chiefs, under the Chieftaincy Act of 2008, have functions of dispute resolution and compilation of customary law. Each traditional area has a Traditional Council and may have more than one Divisional Council. A Chief acts as arbitrator in disputes regarding customary law where parties consent to arbitration (19).

The Legal Awareness Programme (LAP) of Women in Law & Development in Africa (WILDAF) Ghana aims at providing women with sustainable legal education, rights awareness and legal counselling services within the various communities in the Western and Volta regions. The LAP includes training paralegals to extend its coverage (http://www.wildafghana.org/)

The International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) Ghana supports women’s legal literacy through workshops, translations and free legal services. Every year FIDA organises Legal Aid Clinics in the different regions of the country where free legal advice, arbitration and counselling to representation in court are available to persons who cannot afford the services of a lawyer (http://www.h-net.org/~deitutu/fida/index.html)