Digital solutions for African elections in the time of COVID-19
Posted: 22 April, 2020 Filed under: Marystella Auma Simiyu | Tags: 2020 African election calendar, African Charter, African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, Article 25, coronavirus, COVID-19, e-voting, ECOWAS, election, Election Management Body, emergency powers, Estonia, fair elections, free and fair elections, Guinea, human rights, ICCPR, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Mali, mitigation measures, postpone, PPE, public emergency, referendum, social distancing measures, South Korea, voters, voting, World Health Organisation Leave a comment
Author: Marystella Auma Simiyu
Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria
According to the 2020 African election calendar, at least 23 countries had scheduled a presidential, legislative and/or local election. As of 20 April 2020, 10 of these countries including South Africa, Tunisia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, The Gambia, Cameroon, Libya, Ethiopia, Kenya and Ghana had been forced to postpone these elections and other electioneering activities due to the risk and uncertainty posed by the COVID-19 pandemic that has upended ordinary socio-economic and political activities.
A socio-legal analysis of Nigeria’s Protection from Internet Falsehoods, Manipulations and Other Related Matters Bill
Posted: 5 December, 2019 Filed under: Tomiwa Ilori | Tags: Africa, Bill, Constitution of Nigeria, dissemination of information, ECOWAS, Fake News, false statements, freedom of expression, Frivolous Petitions Bill of 2015, ICCPR, internal rules, Internet Falsehoods, legislation, Manipulation, Manipulation and Other Related Matters Bill, Nigeria, Nigerian Communications Commission, online freedom of expression, platform regulation, Protection from Internet Falsehoods, restriction of content, social media, social media platforms 3 Comments
Author: Tomiwa Ilori
HRDA Alumni Coordinator/Researcher: Democracy, Transparency and Digital Rights Unit, Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria
Introduction
The curbing of information disorder online has become one of the most contentious areas in platform regulation. Not only do states struggle with the best approach to fulfill their responsibility to safeguard human rights, non-state actors, especially social media platforms are stepping in with self-imposed rules that may reflect scale but struggle with context on regulating free speech. The most prevalent challenge facing social media regulation, especially outside the United States whose free speech regime is regarded as liberal, is the varying degrees of the protection of free speech in other jurisdictions. Social media platforms also face the challenge of protecting free speech on one hand and catering to national contexts on the other. These variations are often due to the different socio-political local context of each country.
Citizen media and the freedom of expression
Posted: 25 March, 2019 Filed under: Adebayo Okeowo | Tags: article 19(2), citizen media, civilian journalists, Human Rights Committee, human rights violations, ICCPR, police malfeasance, right to freedom of expression, right to record, serve to inform, social media 1 Comment
Author: Adebayo Okeowo
Advocacy Coordinator, Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria
If you have ever found yourself whipping out your phone to film or photograph police officers brutally beating up peaceful protesters, and you subsequently share that video or picture on social media, you have just contributed to citizen media. You are also someone who can be referred to as a citizen journalist. This is just one of the several scenarios in which civilian witnesses are – knowingly or unknowingly – helping to document evidence of human rights violations.
Citizen media encapsulates videos, pictures or audio produced by non-professional journalists, especially using their mobile phone as a tool. Citizen media started gaining prominence when an increasing number of civilians became equipped with smartphones and had access to social media.
The impact of Internet shutdowns in Africa
Posted: 21 February, 2019 Filed under: Tomiwa Ilori | Tags: ACHPR, Africa, African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, African Governments, Arab-spring, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), digital rights, Egypt, electoral malpractices, Freedom of Expression And Access to Information, general elections, ICCPR, ICESCR, internet, internet shutdown, Johannesburg Principles on National Security, national security, public protests, shutdown, Siracusa Principles, state power, Sudan, technology, violations, Zimbabwe 1 Comment
Author: Tomiwa Ilori
LLD Candidate, Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria
In the past, authoritarianism like any other form of illegitimacy has always been paranoid of disruptions. The internet, since its decentralisation in the last century, has blurred boundary lines, projected a classless society and looked to upset apple carts in political spaces. It is typical that this form of “magic” that could redefine state power rattled many governments. African governments soon began to show overt signs of paranoia and not too long, Africa became the first continent to experience an internet shutdown in Egypt on 28 January 2011. Since then, several governments in Africa have constantly violated digital rights with the justification of national security which supposes that both are mutually exclusive.
The impact of state surveillance and censorship of sexuality on the lives of LGB Ethiopians living in Addis Ababa
Posted: 28 January, 2019 Filed under: Selamawit Tsegaye Lulseged | Tags: Addis Ababa, African Charter, African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, censorship, constitution, constitutional ban, Criminal Code, discrimination, eroticism, Ethiopia, FDRE, hegemony, hetero-normative, human rights, ICCPR, ICESCR, imprisonment, International Bill of Rights, LGB, Penal Code, same-sex, same-sex sexual act, sexual minority rights, sexuality Leave a comment
Author: Selamawit Tsegaye Lulseged
African Union Human Rights Observers Mission in Burundi (formerly)
Dialogue regarding same-sex sexual act and eroticism is a recent phenomenon in Ethiopia. As is true for most African countries, in Ethiopia, there is a strong heterosexual culture that bases its legitimacy on the hegemony of masculinity. The social construction is based on the values of family that depends on traditional gender role and religious dogmas. In many discourses, lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) individuals are mentioned in relation to pedophilia, mental sickness and people who chose deviant sexual behavior. Thus, same-sex sexuality is not only something that is pushed under the rug, but also subjected to state scrutiny and embargo.
Freedom of expression: Hopes, anxieties and skepticism in Liberia’s nascent democracy
Posted: 2 August, 2018 Filed under: Urias Teh Pour | Tags: constitution, Criminal Libel laws, decriminalise free speech, ECOWAS Treaty, free speech, freedom of expression, Freedom of Information Act, George Manneh Weah, human rights, ICCPR, Konate v. Burkina Faso, Liberia, Liberian Football legend, Ministry of Information, New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, newly elected Governmen, Penal Law, Table Mountain Declaration, UN Human Rights Committee 2 Comments
Author: Urias Teh Pour
Legal Advisor on the Liberia Law Society Land Rights and Freedom of Expression Projects
The recent move to repeal Liberia’s Criminal Libel laws by the newly elected Government of former Liberian Football legend, George Manneh Weah, has been hailed by human rights groups as a positive step in the right direction. The effort to decriminalise section 11.11 of the Penal Law comes barely two months following the visit of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression to Liberia. The UN Officials called on the Government of Liberia to review all laws that undermine free speech, as guaranteed by article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and other instruments ratified by Liberia.
The outlaws in Malawi: The travails of sexual minorities in a Southern African country
Posted: 10 July, 2018 Filed under: Urerimam Raymond Shamaki | Tags: criminalize, discrimination, homosexuality, ICCPR, intersex, LGBTI, Malawi, Penal Code, sex reassignment surgery, sexual minorities, transgender, transsexual 1 Comment
Author: Urerimam Raymond Shamaki
Barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court of Nigeria; LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa) Candidate
Introduction
Homosexuality is still considered a crime in many countries of the world. Malawi is one of the 33 countries in Africa and 72 in the world that still criminalises homosexuality. Although there is no direct law prohibiting homosexuality in Malawi such as is the case in countries like Nigeria with the Same-Sex Prohibition Act 2015, there are still provisions of some laws indirectly affecting homosexual activities in Malawi. This article briefly reviews some of the provisions of these laws and how they impact on the rights of sexual minorities in Malawi.
The idea of an African passport and the freedom of movement of persons in the continent: Only wishful thinking?
Posted: 22 February, 2016 Filed under: Cristiano d'Orsi | Tags: Africa, African Charter, African passport, African Union, asylum-seekers, AU Executive Council, Declaration on Migration, EAC, ECOWAS, federation, freedom of movement, ICCPR, ICRMW, IDP, International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, migration, Protocol on Facilitation of Movement of Persons, refugees, regional integration, SADC, territory, United States of Africa, USAf 4 Comments
Author: Cristiano d’Orsi
Post-Doctoral Researcher and Lecturer, Centre for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria (South Africa)
“Hail! United States of Africa-free!
Hail! Motherland most bright, divinely fair!
State in perfect sisterhood united,
Born of truth; mighty thou shalt ever be.”
This is the incipit of the poem Hail, United States of Africa, composed in 1924 by M.M. Garvey, a famous Pan-Africanist leader.
This poem is considered to have initiated the concept of United States of Africa (USAf), a federation, extensible to all the fifty-four sovereign states, on the African continent.
In 2002, at the launch of the African Union (AU), President T. Mbeki, its first chairman, proclaimed that: “By forming the Union, the peoples of our continent have made the unequivocal statement that Africa must unite! We as Africans have a common and a shared destiny!”[1]
After that occasion, the concept of USAf has been highlighted in a more concrete way by other African leaders, such as A.O. Konaré in 2006,[2] M. Gaddafi in 2009 –the first to mention the possibility to issue a unique passport for the entire continent-[3] and, more recently, by R. Mugabe.[4]
International human rights day: A call to Eritrea to own up to its shocking human rights record!
Posted: 14 December, 2015 Filed under: Lebogang Maxelegu | Tags: 10 December 2015, African Court of Justice and Human Rights, CEDAW, COI, Committee on the Rights of the Child, Convention on the Rights of the Child, discrimination, Eritrea, forced labour, ICCPR, international human rights obligations, MDG, situation of human rights in Eritrea, UDHR, UNHRC, United Nations General Assembly, UPR Leave a comment
Author: Lebogang Maxelegu
Assistant Researcher, Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria
10 December 2015 marked the 65th anniversary of the International Human Rights Day, which the international community celebrates annually to commemorate the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) in 1948. The UDHR is arguably the first global document to pronounce on human rights standards that countries ought to aspire to. Though not a treaty itself and therefore not binding on Member States, the UDHR serves as the cornerstone for the definition of human rights and fundamental freedoms as outlined in the United Nations Charter, which is legally binding on all State Parties including Eritrea which joined the United Nations(UN) in 1993.
The UDHR is also the bedrock upon which treaties such the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) were founded. Eritrea has notably ratified both covenants, further and invariably placing upon itself a legal obligation to abide by the human rights norms enunciated in the declaration as well as other ratified treaties.
The United Nations General Assembly held its Seventieth Session in October 2015, during which the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Eritrea, H.E. Mr. Osman Saleh, was invited to address the assembly. In his speech, the Honourable Minister declared that Eritrea is making remarkable progress in building a nation founded on the respect for human rights, contrary to what he described as “unfair and baseless accusations” of human rights violations that Eritrea has been subjected to. But is Eritrea truly making the progress that it has committed itself to in terms of the UDHR? Is it being unfairly targeted by the international community? These questions warrant an examination of some of the observations on the state of human rights in Eritrea made by treaty bodies and the Commission of Inquiry (COI) on the situation of human rights in Eritrea.
To achieve transformation, Kenyan law needs to shun a hierarchy of sources
Posted: 17 August, 2015 Filed under: Humphrey Sipalla | Tags: constitutional law, dualism, echanistic jurisprudence, hierarchy of sources, ICCPR, ICJ, international law, ius cogens, Kenya, law enforcement, law reform, monism, transformation, transformative constitutionalism, Uhuru Park, use of force, Wangari Maathai 3 Comments
Author: Humphrey Sipalla
Freelance editor
It is opined by some in Kenya that the regime of former President Moi hardly broke constitutional law. For the most part, it rather, applying provisos and rigid compartmentalised thinking, bended and stretched it absurdly. There may be some truth to this. Previously on this platform, I opined that Kenyan society is prone to absolutes, in that instance, equating legitimate use of force with its disproportionate immoral use in “law enforcement”. It would seem that the legal fraternity too suffers its own peculiar version of this Kenyan tendency to be rigid.
At a conference on transformative constitutionalism, Prof. Ambreena Manji noted that for Kenya to realise the aims of its visionary transformative constitution, we needed a certain conversion of the soul, not just the mind, of the Kenyan jurist. At this same conference, the Chief Justice of Kenya, Dr Willy Mutunga lamented the old judiciary’s reliance of “mechanistic jurisprudence”. Such judicial policy led to the dismissal of the late Wangari Maathai’s (later Nobel Peace Prize Laureate) 1989 case against government plans to build a 60 storey building on Nairobi’s Uhuru Park as she did not show what injury would befall her were the environment to be spoilt. In 1989 too, the High Court held that the Bill of Rights could not be enforced as the Chief Justice had not issued enforcement rules as obligated by the Constitution. In 1993, again, presidential candidate, Kenneth Matiba’s election petition ground to a halt as he was unable to serve the sitting president with suit papers personally.
AfricLaw 