Protecting Environmental and Health Rights in Africa: Mechanisms for Enforcement
Date
2006-07
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Canadian Institute of Resources Law
Abstract
This paper is the fourth publication to come from the Human Rights and Resource Development Project. The latter half of the twentieth century witnessed significant international activity on human rights issues. A considerable number of the human rights abuses in Africa and elsewhere, that garnered international attention, implicated natural resource exploitation carried out by large multinational corporations, sometimes in conjunction with State entities. This paper, the fourth publication to come from the Human Rights and Resource Development Project, engages in African human rights discourse with particular reference to the mechanisms for protecting and enforcing environmental and health rights. Some of the major themes that run through the paper include the liability of multinational corporations (if any), for human rights violations in Africa, and the incorporation of the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights into domestic law. The paper concludes that on a regional level, Africa has some legal instruments capable of addressing the human rights challenges facing the continent, but requires the establishment of enforcement institutions with the capacity to implement these laws.
Description
This paper was part of the Human Rights and Resource Development Project.
Keywords
African human rights, environmental and health rights
Citation
Ibironke Odumosu, Protecting Environmental and Health Rights in Africa: Mechanisms for Enforcement, Human Rights Paper #4 (Calgary: Canadian Institute of Resources Law, 2006)