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Africa's
human rights record cause for concern
Media
Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Regional Secretariat
May 14, 2009
The 45th Ordinary Session
of the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights (ACHPR) opened
in the Gambian capital, Banjul on 13 May 2009 with the Commission's
chairperson Justice Sanji Mmasenono Monageng lamenting that perpetrators
of human rights violations are not being punished in Africa.
"Many of our communities
have been battered by war and torn asunder by conflicts and in the
debris of injustice many of the perpetrators of some of the most
heinous crimes of war have seemingly gone unpunished. So many of
our communities need peace, but they need justice as well,"
said Justice Monageng.
She noted that the state
of the rule of law in some African countries left a lot to be desired
despite the adoption of constitutions that explicitly protect human
rights.
She urged civil society,
intergovernmental organisations and governments to vigorously pursue
efforts towards the emergence of an African continent where impunity
would not be tolerated but where justice and democracy would be
guaranteed for its millions of citizens. Justice Monageng said civic
society and other human rights defenders should therefore continue
to hold governments to account on the standards they have signed
onto.
"There
is thus an obligation upon governments to translate these purely
legislative instruments into pragmatic gains - and this a duty of
government- not a choice. The trumpet has sounded- not as a call
to arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled
we are; but as a call to continue to bear the hard grind of realising
the promises of the (African)
Charter and the Universal
Declaration on Human Rights," she said.
The 14-day 45th Ordinary
Session of the ACHPR is being held under the theme: Human Rights,
Our Collective Responsibility.
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