[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

MBABANE, 3 July (IRIN) - A new constitution has granted Swazi women a degree of protection that is shocking tradition-bound Swazi men as an education campaign tours the conservative kingdom outlining those hard-won rights.

"The rights of HIV-positive women, inheritance issues for unwed couples, child maintenance and domestic violence - all these new issues for Swazis are addressed in law. The traditional family structure cannot cope with these," said Sibonlo Mdluli, one of a team of eight lawyers addressing community meetings across the country.

Until the new constitution was signed into law by King Mswati III at the beginning of the year, Swazi women were second-class citizens, unable to own property in their own names or even open a bank account without the assent of a male relative.

The Swazi branch of the regional NGO, Women in Law, has targeted half the country's 365 chiefdoms in the new education campaign. The lawyers make their presentation and engage residents in discussion during regular weekend community meetings, driving the message home that on paper, at least, women are now equal.

"We have a readymade audience, but they are not at all passive! The men, in particular, give us a tough time, but we are educating them," said Sempiwe Dlamini, project officer for the new initiative.

At a meeting at Nhletsheni, a rural hamlet 80km from the capital, Mbabane, the issue that raised the most heat was child maintenance. "Why should I pay for a child that is not mine? All the woman has to do is accuse me!" said Paulos Ndwandwe, a local farmer, virtually shouting in anger at the visiting women lawyers.

By law, a man identified as the father of a child by the child's mother must pay maintenance, unless he undergoes a paternity test to prove he is not the father. But the DNA test costs the equivalent of US$400 in a country where the average monthly wage is US$187 and the unemployment rate is 45 percent.

"Even if I were the child's father, why should I support the child if the woman sleeps around with other men?" said Ndwandwe. Other men in the crowd voiced their agreement. Infidelity by women is considered scandalous, but the cultural norm for men.

In terms of women's rights, the constitution is unclear about which is ultimately superior: customary law or the constitution itself. "This is the most difficult thing when we speak with women; this clash of the constitution and customs," said Lomcebo Dlamini, national director of Women in Law.

"A perfect illustration is the story that is all over the news this week," said lawyer Sempiwe Dlamini. "A 20-year-old man married a 14-year-old girl, who he impregnated when she was 13. Under the constitution, he would be arrested. But they are saying this is okay because he married the girl traditionally, under Swazi custom. The girl's father accepted cattle dowry for her."

Child welfare NGOs and women's groups decried the marriage. The Times of Swaziland's senior editor, Martin Dlamini, summed up the clash of tradition versus modern sensibilities: "If culture dictates that dowry can buy human beings and subject them to a life of slavery, please call me unSwazi," Dlamini wrote.

With more Swazis living as common-law spouses without getting married, the constitution says the surviving spouse in such a union is entitled to inherit his or her partner's estate. This also sparked controversy at rural Nhletsheni.

"It is the family that is entitled to a man's estate, and his things must be kept in the family," said Joe Mdluli, voicing a widespread belief. By custom, all a man's property goes to his parental homestead.

"But that was yesterday," countered Thab'sile, an Nhletsheni resident in a quiet but assured voice. "That was when we all lived at the same homestead. A man's estate was the content of his hut, and his cows. Now, people live in towns - they have cars, and many things they acquired through jobs, with the assistance of their spouses. The family at the country homestead did nothing to get those things, so why should the widow be denied when her man dies?"