Inheritance and Succession: Customary Law, Practice and Procedure

Abstract

Basically, customary law is flexible, unwritten and contextual. Being flexible simply means its rules change with time. Its unwritten form enhances its flexibility while its contextuality ensures that each community is bound by what it recognizes and practices as its custom giving credence to the fact that there is no customary common law or customary law of general application. As a mirror of accepted usage, a custom, like a mirror, neither keeps a permanent form nor reflects the same form every time. It is offensive to the intrinsic nature of customary law to codify it as it will invariably lose its flexibility. Customary law must not be crystalized or codified in any way, either by case law, statute or textual authorities. When this happens, customary law loses its essence and becomes just another common or statutory law to which their rules, which are at cross-purposes with customary law, invariably apply.