How inheritance laws in Zimbabwe punish the poor and protect the rich

In Zimbabwe, even death seems to have become a privilege reserved for the rich.

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For most ordinary people, the death of a loved one is not only a time of grief but the beginning of a long, painful struggle with bureaucracy, unaffordable fees, and a legal system that seems designed to punish rather than protect.

The process of transferring a deceased person’s property to their rightful heir has become so complicated and costly that many families simply give up.

They are left trapped in legal limbo, unable to use or benefit from what is rightfully theirs.

This is a tragedy that plays out quietly across the country every day.

A mother dies and leaves a modest house or car to her child.

Her Will, if she had one, clearly states her intentions.

Yet, because the property still bears her name, her child cannot use it legally until it is registered with the Master of the High Court and properly transferred.

That means hiring lawyers, paying executor’s fees, travelling long distances to Harare or Bulawayo, and waiting months or even years for the process to be completed.

For most families already struggling to put food on the table, in a country where over 80% live below the poverty datum line, such procedures are beyond reach.

And so, the car rusts in the driveway, the house remains frozen in the deceased’s name, and the heir becomes a prisoner of paperwork.

The law, as it stands, treats the deceased’s estate as though it belongs to a corporation rather than a family.

Until the Master of the High Court formally registers the estate and appoints an executor, all property technically belongs to the “Estate of the Late [Name].”

The heirs have no legal standing to use, sell, or even insure that property.

The law is blind to compassion or common sense.

It does not see a son or daughter who has lost a parent—it sees only an “unauthorized user of estate property.”

Consider a typical example: a young man whose late mother left him her car.

She even wrote a Will naming him as the sole beneficiary and universal heir to all her property.

Yet, because the car remains registered in her name, he cannot lawfully drive it.

If he were to get into an accident, insurance companies would likely reject the claim because the insured person—the mother—is deceased, and the vehicle technically belongs to an unregistered estate.

So, he must watch his late mother’s car gather dust, knowing it’s his in every moral and emotional sense, but not in the eyes of a cold, bureaucratic system.

How can a country that claims to empower its people have a legal process that traps them in such misery?

Why must the transfer of property from a deceased parent to their child require a lawyer, court papers, and thousands of dollars in fees?

Shouldn’t there be a simpler, humane way of handling small estates?

Why must one report an estate to the Master of the High Court in Harare when one lives in a small town like Redcliff or Gokwe?

It is as if the system assumes that everyone who dies in Zimbabwe leaves behind millions in assets, and everyone who survives them can afford a lawyer and endless trips to the capital.

Yet this assumption could not be more misguided.

The government and the law seem to believe that simply because someone left behind a house in the suburbs, they must have been wealthy — and that their heirs will automatically be in a financial position to bear the costs of estate registration and property transfer.

This is a gross distortion of Zimbabwe’s reality.

Many of these homes were bought in the 1980s and 1990s, when the economy was still functional, salaries had real value, and most urban families could afford decent housing and modest comforts.

But the past two decades have completely overturned that world.

The economic collapse of the early 2000s wiped out savings, pensions, and investments, leaving many of those same families in dire poverty.

Today, countless former civil servants and professionals survive on meagre pensions of around US$50 a month — while their children and grandchildren struggle to find jobs or stable incomes.

To assume that inheriting a house worth, say, US$55,000 means inheriting wealth is therefore absurd.

These are families rich only in memories and history, not in disposable income, and yet the Master of the High Court will require 4% of the property’s gross value, on top of legal fees, which can push the total cost of inheritance registration and transfer to over US$7,000.

Where are they expected to find such staggering sums when most are struggling just to put food on the table?

These are families rich only in memories and history, not in disposable income.

For the law to treat them as if they were affluent is not only unrealistic but profoundly unjust.

It punishes ordinary citizens for being poor.

It traps grieving families in endless bureaucracy.

It creates fertile ground for corruption, as some officials exploit the desperation of heirs who are simply trying to regularize their inheritance.

In the end, those with money and connections can speed up the process, while the rest languish for years.

The saddest part is that even those who do everything right—who make Wills, register them properly, and clearly state their intentions—still leave behind families who must jump through the same legal hoops.

What is the point of making a Will if the State still treats your heirs as strangers to your property until they pay their way through the system?

Death should not be a financial burden or a legal trap; it should be a time when a family can find closure and stability.

Instead, for many Zimbabweans, it marks the beginning of another round of suffering.

This outdated colonial legal framework for estate administration was designed for an elite minority, not for the ordinary Zimbabwean.

It assumes access to lawyers, accountants, and urban courts—luxuries beyond the reach of the majority.

Decades after independence, we still operate under a legal inheritance system that alienates the very people it should serve.

Reforming this system should not even be a debate—it should be a moral and social imperative.

There is no reason the process cannot be simplified.

The government could create a special category for small estates, allowing local magistrates’ courts or district administrators to handle them.

Executor and legal fees could be capped or waived for low-value estates.

Mobile Master’s offices could be deployed across provinces, sparing families from travelling hundreds of kilometres.

Provisional transfers could be allowed for movable property like cars, where ownership can later be formalized once estate paperwork is complete.

These are not radical ideas—they are simple, humane reforms that acknowledge the realities of the poor.

The truth is, many people in Zimbabwe die intestate not because they are careless, but because they know how useless the system is for their families.

What comfort is there in drafting a Will when your children will still need lawyers and court fees to inherit a car or a small house?

Why should the law be more interested in forms and fees than in fulfilling the wishes of the deceased and protecting the dignity of their survivors?

Death should never be a privilege.

Yet in Zimbabwe, it has become exactly that.

Only those who can afford the paperwork and the procedures can rest assured that their property will pass to their loved ones without trouble.

The poor, even in death, must continue to struggle—fighting not for justice, but for access to it.

That is the cruelest form of inequality: when even death refuses to free the poor from suffering.

• Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice advocate and writer. Please feel free to WhatsApp or Call: +263715667700 | +263782283975, or email: mbofana.tendairuben73@gmail.com, or visit website: https://mbofanatendairuben.news.blog/