Decisions by the African Commission on Individual Communications under the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights

Abstract

The African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, adopted by the 18th Assembly of the Heads of State and Government of the Organisation of African Unity in Nairobi in 1981, which came into force in 1986, provided for a single commission with a wide range of powers in respect of the rights in the Charter. This was as a result of an initiative for an African regional mechanism for the protection of human rights by African jurists and subsequent conferences in the 1960s and 1970s, many of which were organised by the United Nations. In these debates several possibilities were raised for the form that such a body should take: from a proposal for several commissions, given the disparate and diverse cultural and political nature of African States a court, a specialised commission within the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), to a single commission. Not only was its structure contentious but also its functions, in particular whether these should include a protective as well as a promotional mandate and what such protective powers should be.