The Protection of the Fundamental Rights of the Child in the Light of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (original) (raw)
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The paper seeks to analyse the provisions of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACRWC). The paper seeks to make this analysis based on the harmonisation and monism theories of the relationship between international law and municipal law which states that international pieces of law are essentially created to be domesticated within the municipal law of a state and vice versa. To this end, the ACRWC essentially acts as a blueprint for the facilitation of domestic measures and municipal law aimed at upholding children's rights in Africa. The ACRWC should then be an immaculate blueprint that can be followed by states so as to churn out domestic measures that are in the best interests of the child. The paper however seeks to assess whether there are vague, uncouth and contradictory articles within the provisions of the charter that might be interpreted by the states to the detriment of the rights of the African child.
The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child
The African Union: Legal and Institutional Framework, 2012
This version updates that chapter and introduces substantially new material, occasioned by the more active role played in recent times by the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child in fulfilling its mandates. 1 UN General Assembly 44th Session, UN Doc A/Res/44/25 (1989).
The 12th and 13th meetings of the African Children's Committee were held in November 2008 and April 2009 respectively. With the African Children's Charter entering its 10th year since entry into force, the real work of the African Committee is now beginning. With the consideration of the first country reports to the African Committee, the benefits of a regionally-specific child rights treaty has begun to become apparent. The recent establishment of a formal grouping of civil society organisations and individuals dedicated to furthering the regional influence of the African Children's Charter (first mooted in 2004!) comes at an opportune time. Despite some of the recurring shortcomings in the work of the Committee, it is hoped that the development of a strategic plan for the Committee's work for the period 2010 to 2014 will lay some of these concerns to rest.
Open journal of social sciences, 2024
African states rushed to adopt the International Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989, and at the same time set up an African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child in 1990, after justifying the need for an instrument that took account of the social and cultural realities of African children's rights. Using documentary techniques, the results of our research show that the African Charter is based on the general principles of children's rights, namely the right to non-discrimination, the right to the best interests of the child, the right to life, survival and development, the right to protection against all forms of exploitation, and the right to participation or the right to be heard. In application of these general principles, the African States wanted a response that kept in mind the historical context of the social realities of children's rights, especially children under the apartheid regime, but also the situation of children whose mothers are imprisoned, the situation of child begging, the exploitation of children, and so on. In spite of this initiative, African states are reluctant to implement their demands to the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, in addition to the delay in ratifying or acceding to the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, which has not been the case with ratification of the International Convention on the Rights of the Child and the production of reports to its protection body.
There have been many praises as well as criticisms against both the on the rights of the child child. However, many writers are of the view that the African charter unnecessary duplication of the convention. differences and similarities between the UN convention on the rights of the child, and the African children's charter. The right treaties internationally and on the African continent, and argues that the adoption of the African call for regional arrangements for the protection therefore not an unnecessary duplication of the UN convention 1. BACKGROUND: INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN'S RIGHTS In 1924 the League of Nations (now United Nations) endorsed the first the Rights of the Child, (also known as the Geneva Declaration) with claims to save and protect the 'delinquent and the waif' (Jones, 2005). The document is regarded as th instrument that deals specifically with children's in need of protection, rather than individuals with personal rights (Gal, 2006). For exam...
Recent Advances in Children’s Rights in the African Human Rights System
The Law & Practice of International Courts and Tribunals, 2016
This case note reviews recent developments in the protection of children’s rights in Africa through the individual communications mandate of the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (the Committee). It examines the recent decision of the Committee concerning the Talibés of Senegal. It argues that whilst the Committee took a commendable progressive approach in the interpretation of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, its decision lacked a gender sensitive approach which it must address in future communications.
African Human Rights Law Journal, 2009
This article charts the development of a child law jurisprudence that is emerging in Eastern and Southern Africa. The article records how judgments are beginning to make reference to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, and even to less prominent instruments such as the Hague Convention on the Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Inter-Country Adoption (1993) and the Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. Attention is paid to certain textual differences between the UN Convention and the African Children's Charter, and the extent to which these discrepancies have played a role in the development of a child law jurisprudence that might be described as uniquely African. The article considers judgments in the region that have expressly dealt with the 'best interests' principle. Examples from Botswana, South Africa and Kenya are described. The seco...