Dingake laments poor human rights in Africa
Bame Piet | Thursday November 23, 2017 16:20
Making a presentation at the 2017 Annual Jurists Conference in Kenya this week, Dingake said although human rights are enshrined or codified in many African constitutions, governments and individuals do not fully embrace the humanity of every person.
“Traditionally, human rights were considered a shield against governments; to protect the people against governmental abuse and neglect. Today, we know that even individuals and private entities can, and do infringe human rights,” Dingake told a gathering, which convened under the theme ‘State of Human Rights in Africa: Bridging the gap between Aspirations, Implementation and Enforcement’.
He said the situation of human rights in Africa is a mixed one - there have been notable achievements especially in the area of civil and political rights compared to the past era of one party state.
He cited, amongst others, access to justice as one of the biggest challenges that marginalised members of society face.
“Access to justice in our continent, especially by the marginalised and the poor is a major concern. For instance, sexual gender-based violence is one of the most prevalent crimes against women. Yet women are finding it difficult to access the courts on account of gender stereotypes, discriminatory legal provisions and cultural norms; including the requirement for corroboration in rape cases in some countries,” he said. Dingake further noted that poor people and juveniles do not have access to justice and in some countries children are imprisoned with adults.
Another observation Dingake made is that African governments usually operate outside the law to silence dissenting voices by civil society, media, opposition parties, human rights defenders that seek to hold them accountable.
“In many countries, in this continent, human rights defenders, the media are often arbitrarily arrested and detained. Quite often, heavy-handed administrative measures are undertaken to de-register trade unions and other civil society groups, authorities sometimes going so far as freezing bank accounts in order to clip the wings of some of these formations.”
He warned that political intolerance and repression of political opponents has led to conflicts that have led to a serious refugee problem in Africa, forcing other countries to bear the heavy load of hosting refugees. Freedom of expression, the judge observed, has also suffered the brutality of some regimes in the continent the same way as freedom of association.
“Non Governmental Organisations (NGO) and media laws are being passed with broad and vague terminology facilitating judicial proceedings against human rights organisations and media outlets under the guise of “threatening national security,” the Judge said, adding that; “In many other countries peaceful protests calling upon governments to account are violently suppressed and space for political opposition is hardly existent and with opposition leaders jailed”.
He said that the continent has very little regard for disabled persons, people living with HIV as they are stigmatised and denied opportunities that are availed to other members of society. “Persons who are living with HIV or are perceived to be HIV positive are discriminated against and stigmatised. Discrimination against people with TB is also quite widespread,” he said. Dingake noted, “The major problem of the African human rights mechanism is the weak human rights institutions that do not have any power to make any meaningful difference. The other problem is the weak enforcement mechanism”.