Malawi, particularly among the Chewa people, follows a matrilineal system of inheritance, where property and land are passed down through the mother's lineage. In this system, a child cannot inherit land or property from their father, but instead, their rights come through their mother. This is a defining feature of Chewa society, as well as other ethnic groups like the Lomwe, Yao, Mang'anja, and Nyanja, which together make up over 80% of Malawi's population.
In Chewa culture, a man essentially has two homes: his motherland, where he was born and raised, and his matrilocal home, where he moves after marriage. The motherland is the home of his mother and siblings, where people live as a close-knit community, caring for one another. When a man marries, he is expected to leave his motherland and settle in his wife’s home. This matrilocal practice reflects the deep-rooted matrilineal customs of the Chewa, where a man's children will inherit land and property through their mother, not their father.
Interestingly, even chieftaincy follows this matrilineal structure. When a chief dies, one of the men who had married and moved away to his wife’s home is recalled to his motherland to take up the chieftaincy. However, his children, born to a wife from another village, cannot inherit his position or property. Upon his death, these children return to their mother’s village, as inheritance for them flows through their mother’s lineage, not their father’s.
Thus, among the Chewa and many other tribes in Malawi, it is always a woman from the village, not an outsider, who gives rise to the next chief, ensuring the continuity of matrilineal inheritance.
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