African Human Rights Yearbook Volume 8 (2024)

Editorial

The three institutions making up the African regional human rights system, the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, decided to jointly publish the African Human Rights Yearbook, to spearhead studies on the promotion and protection of human rights, and to provide a forum for constructive engagement about the African human rights system with academics and other human rights commentators on the continent. Volume 8 of the Yearbook,published in 2024, contains 23 contributions by scholars from Africa and beyond.

Without a doubt, the Commission, the Committee and the Court remain the key human rights institutions of the African Union (AU). Given the AU’s commitment to the promotion and protection of human rights, as most unequivocally expressed in its Constitutive Act, it behoves these three institutions to make a discernible, and enduring, contribution towards the promotion and protection of human rights. In so far as the place of human rights in the AU’s work is concerned, it is also important to note that Agenda 2063, Africa’s blueprint for comprehensive development, acknowledges the central role that the protection and promotion of human rights will play. Unsurprisingly, one of the key aspirations of Agenda 2063 is an Africa of good governance, democracy, respect for human rights, justice and the rule of law. The attainment of this aspiration will require that all human rights institutions within the AU, be appropriately capacitated to fulfil their statutory mandates.