Abstract
The evolving jurisprudence of the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights displays ambiguities in interpretations of the peoples' rights provisions of the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights. The article comparatively examines the Endorois and Southern Cameroon decisions adopted in 2009 in an effort to uncover the challenges faced by the African Commission in contextually applying peoples' rights provisions of the African Charter to particular collectives. In the Endorois case, the Commission made a positive finding on violations of applicants' claims of violations of their collective rights as an indigenous people. Conversely, in the Southern Cameroon case, the Commission made a negative finding on the applicants' arguments for remedial secession, using more or less the same collective rights provisions of the African Charter. The article contextualises the two cases in critically examining the African Commission's legal reasoning in both decisions.
Highlights
More than three decades since the adoption of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (African Charter),[1] uncertainty persists over the boundaries of applicability of ‘peoples’’ rights provisions codified in the instrument
In reaching the conclusion that the Endorois are an indigenous people, the African Commission rehearsed the mantra of indigenous collective rights norms, jurisprudence and discourses as elaborated by national and regional systems, and international institutions or networks.[20]
The indigenous rights narrative in the Endorois decision contrasts with the language of the Ogoni decision rendered in 2001 where the African Commission found violations of the applicants’ collective rights as a people without any recourse to indigenous rights precepts.[25]. Since both groups are enrolled in the global indigenous movement[26] and indigenous rights are not, after all, explicitly recognised in the African Charter, the focus on the indigenous attributes of the Endorois can only be read against the background of ongoing efforts by the African Commission to promote this particular legal framework on the continent
Summary
The evolving jurisprudence of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights displays ambiguities in interpretations of the peoples’ rights provisions of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. The article comparatively examines the Endorois and Southern Cameroon decisions adopted in 2009 in an effort to uncover the challenges faced by the African Commission in contextually applying peoples’ rights provisions of the African Charter to particular collectives. In the Endorois case, the Commission made a positive finding on violations of applicants’ claims of violations of their collective rights as an indigenous people. In the Southern Cameroon case, the Commission made a negative finding on the applicants’ arguments for remedial secession, using more or less the same collective rights provisions of the African Charter. The article contextualises the two cases in critically examining the African Commission’s legal reasoning in both decisions
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