In this enlightening book, John Mukum Mbaku analyses the main challenges of constitutional design and the construction of governance institutions in Africa today. He argues that the central issues are: providing each country with a constitutional order that is capable of successfully managing sectarian conflict and enhancing peaceful coexistence; protecting the rights of citizens ? including those of minorities; minimizing the monopolization of political space by the majority (to the detriment of minorities); and, effectively preventing government impunity. Mbaku offers a comprehensive analysis of various approaches to the management of diversity, and shows how these approaches can inform Africa?s struggle to promote peace and good governance. He explores in depth the existence of dysfunctional and anachronistic laws and institutions inherited from the colonial state, and the process through which laws and institutions are formulated or constructed, adopted, and amended. A close look at the constitutional experiences of the American Republic provides important lessons for constitutional design and constitutionalism in Africa. Additionally, comparative politics and comparative constitutional law also provide important lessons for the management of diversity in African countries. Mbaku recommends state reconstruction through constitutional design as a way for each African country to provide itself with laws and institutions that reflect the realities of each country, including the necessary mechanisms and tools for the protection of the rights of minorities. From students and scholars to NGOs, lawyers and policymakers, this unique and judicious book is an essential tool for all those seeking to understand and improve governance and development in Africa.
"The present guide offers information related to norms and mechanisms developed to protect the rights of persons belonging to national, ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities. It includes detailed information about procedures and forums in which minority issues may be raised to minorities and by also covering selected specialized agencies and regional mechanisms, the present Guide complements information contained in Working with the United Nations Human Rights Programme: A Handbook for Civil Society"--Introduction.
Unlike the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (hereinafter referred to as the African Charter) and the subsequent African human rights treaties do not consider minorities as a legal category recognized in African human rights law. In a continent where most of the armed conflicts between 1963 and 1998, which affected more than 60 per cent of the population, were due to severe identity or religious differences, this seems hardly understandable. It is all the more incomprehensible if we consider that the regional human rights protection system, set up thanks to the activism of President Léopold Sédar Senghor, is aimed mainly at addressing ‘Africa’s real needs‘. Is this omission the result of a deliberate attempt by those who drafted these various conventions to ignore the existence of minorities completely, or does it reflect the realistic approach which, in the late 1970s, required ‘a common [legal] denominator’ to be established among African countries, prior to a political, economic and social evolution that could pave the way for more effective protection of collective rights taking place? This second option is the one which seems to have prevailed, because, as emphasized by Chairman Kéba Mbaye regarding the African Charter, ‘the writers [of the Charter] were satisfied with making vague hypotheses with regard to several aspects. This approach … was intended to avoid frightening off the representatives of the States and to give way to a dynamic action by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights.’ This implied that minorities could, by taking bold initiatives, assert before the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) a right to the legal status recognized to certain groups, i.e. that of ‘oppressed people’. However, the democratization process the African States went through in the late 1990s, and in particular the advent of the African Union – which believes the development of African societies should enable Africans ‘to assume their identity and condition instead of having to be burdened by them – opened a new era for minorities, as the African States clearly committed themselves to promoting peace, safety and stability within the continent (Constitutive Act of the African Union, Article 3 (f)) and to ensuring that their actions are always based on such essential principles as respect for the sacrosanct nature of human life (Constitutive Act, Article 4 (o)), respect for democratic principles, human rights, the rule of law and good governance (Article 4 (m)), the promotion of equality between men and women (Article 4 (l)), and the condemnation and rejection of impunity. The new environment not only creates the conditions for effective consideration of the situation of minorities by African human rights law but also, more importantly, offers the possibility to all those who are directly interested in the issue to display more creativity and imagination in using the current regional legislation in order to promote and protect the rights of minorities in Africa. This guide is precisely designed to provide all those fighting for the recognition of the inalienable rights of minorities, including organizations created by and for minorities, human rights activists and lawyers, with legal tools that can enable them to cope with the numerous violations of their rights that they encounter on a daily basis. It is also designed to be an effective instrument in pleading the cause of human rights before African regional or sub-regional political institutions put in place to promote human rights in general and of minorities in particular. What is a minority? What are the rights minorities can claim, in the absence of a clear legal definition of ‘minority’, within African States? What are the regional or sub-regional bodies that can be turned to with regard to the implementation of, or advocacy for, these rights? How can the organizations promoting or defending the rights of minorities usefully employ these bodies to promote and defend their cause? How to ensure that the decisions taken by regional jurisdictions and political authorities are effectively implemented? This guide tries to provide useful insights into these questions. The ambition of this guide is to be not only a useful instrument helping in the promotion and defence of the rights of minorities but also an invaluable tool in the training of African activists on the law regarding minorities in Africa. Finally, MRG and its partners hope this guide will lay the foundations for a productive debate on the protection of the rights of minorities in Africa and will pave the way for the imminent elaboration of a treaty which would consider the specific rights of the legal category of minorities.
This book offers a thematic study of key debates in the history of the ethnic politics, democratic governance, and minority rights in Nigeria. Nigeria provides a framework for examining the central paradox in post-colonial nation building projects in Africa – the tension between majority rule and minority rights. The liberal democratic model on which most African states were founded at independence from colonial rule, and to which they continue to aspire, is founded on majority rule. It is also founded on the protection of the rights of minority groups to political participation, social inclusion and economic resources. Maintaining this tenuous balance between majority rule and minority rights has, in the decades since independence, become the key national question in many African countries, perhaps none more so than Nigeria. This volume explores these issues, focusing on four key themes as they relate to minority rights in Nigeria: ethnic and religious identities, nationalism and federalism, political crises and armed conflicts.
This book focuses on trend-setting judgments in different parts of the world that impacted on the rights of persons belonging to minorities and Indigenous people. The cases illustrate how the judiciary has been called upon to fill out the detail of minority protection arrangements and how, in doing so, in many instances the judiciary has taken the respective countries on a course that parliament may not have been able to navigate. In this book authors from various backgrounds in the practical application of minority protection arrangements investigate the role of the judiciary in constitutional arrangements aimed at the protection of the rights of minorities and Indigenous peoples.
Minority Rights Group International (MRG) is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) working to secure the rights of ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities and indigenous peoples worldwide, and to promote cooperation and understanding between communities.
This edited collection explores key human rights themes and situates them in the context of developments on the African continent. It examines critical debates in human rights bringing together conceptually and empirically rich contributions from leading thinkers in human rights and African studies. Drawing on scholarly insights from the fields of constitutional law, human rights, development, feminist studies, public health, and media studies, the volume contributes to scholarly debates on constitutionalism, the right to water, securitization of development, environmental and transitional justice, sexual rights, conflict and gender-based violence, the right to development, and China’s deepening role in Africa. Consequently, it makes an important scholarly intervention on timely issues pertaining to the African continent and beyond.
This book provides a significant contribution to the literature on land reform in various African contexts. While the economic evidence is clear that secure property rights are a necessary condition for catalysing broad-based economic development, the governance process by which those rights are secured is less clear. This book details the historical complexity of land rights and the importance of understanding this history in the process of trying to improve tenure security. Through a combination of single country case studies, comparative case studies and regional comparisons, the book is unequivocal that good governance is paramount for improving the performance of land reform programmes. All attempts at moving towards more formal secure tenure require congruence with informal norms, beliefs and values, and a set of clear systems and processes to avoid corruption and unintended negative consequences.
