The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (the Commission), through its special mechanism on freedom of expression and access to information in Africa, is undertaking an initiative to develop the African Guidelines on Promoting and Harnessing Data Access as a Tool for Advancing Human Rights and Sustainable Development in the Digital Age. This initiative is being undertaken pursuant to Resolution ACHPR/Res.620 (LXXXI) 2024, which was adopted by the Commission during its 81st Ordinary Session, held from 17 October to 06 November 2024, in Banjul, The Gambia.
The draft Guidelines have been developed under the leadership of the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa (the Special Rapporteur).
As part of the consultative process, the Special Rapporteur invites all stakeholders, including State actors, non-State actors, National Human Rights Institutions, civil society organizations, in addition to the Commission’s partners, to forward their inputs on the draft Guidelines, to the Commission by close of business on 14 July 2026.
The draft Guidelines can be found using the link below, to the English, French and Portuguese versions.
Contributions should be sent to the Secretariat of the Commission on the following email addresses: au-banjul@africanunion.org ; HezaE@AfricanUnion.org.
Banjul, 14 April 2026
