This Land Is Ours: New Law Could End Age-Old Injustice Faced by Liberian Women

Sep 17, 2019 | Alexandra Benjamin
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Lofa County, Liberia – Ten women are gathered in the open-air concrete slab building that serves as a community center for Gbonyea, a village a few kilometers from Liberia’s border with Guinea and a five-hour drive from the capital, Monrovia.

Loretta Althea Pope Kai, the charismatic program director for local NGO the Foundation for Community Initiatives (FCI), asks the women a series of questions, each one focused on whether they own land. Virtually none of them do.

For around two hours, the women outline the challenges they face, and Pope Kai carefully steers them through their rights. As the meeting draws to a close, the group breaks into an impassioned rallying call: “We want land. We want land…”