ABSTRACT
In many developing countries, the majority of land is held under customary tenure. Despite the Constitutional and legislative guarantee on the recognition and protection of the customary land rights in Tanzania, customary land tenure suffers from inadequate legal protection. Section 18 (1) of the Village Land Act, 1999 provides that, a customary right of occupancy is in every respect of equal status and effect to a granted right of occupancy. However, in the contrary, the Land Act, 1999 provides that, a customary right of occupancy can be uprooted in favour of the granted right of occupancy. The Land Act, 1999 also provides that, when granted right of occupancy conflicts with customary right of occupancy, the customary right of occupancy will be defeated. The study employed the doctrinal legal research to assess the protection of customary land right in Tanzania. The observations which were made in the course of this study revealed that, although majority of Tanzanians own their un-surveyed lands under customary right of occupancy, nevertheless, the land laws failed to serve the purpose of protecting the customary land rights against the granted right of occupancy. Thus, resulting to a total denial of the land rights of the majority of Tanzanians who own their lands under customary tenure. It is recommended that; the government should amend the laws which hinder the protection of the customary land rights in order to strengthen the protection of the customary land tenure in Tanzania.
Key words: Protection; customary land rights; Land laws; Tanzania.