"The objectives of the study are as follows: 1. To critically examine the efficacy of the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Women in Africa (SRRWA) with particular emphasis on the new legal framework created by the Protocol. 2. To investigate the operation of some universal and regional organs with comparable mandate, and their possible relevance to the improvement of the SRRWA. 3. To put forward recommendations for the improvement of the mandate of the SRRWA that will enhance its impact on the promotion and protection of women's rights in Africa. ... Following this introduction, the study is divided into three chapters. The first chapter traces the envolvement of the SRRWA in the Commission, provides its current operations and briefly expounds on the other mechanisms in the Commission targeting women. The second chapter evaluates both the terms of the mandate (within the context of the Protocol), and its successes and shortcomings. The third chapter explores comparative international and regional protection mechanisms and their possible relevance to the SRRWA. The fourth chapter contains recommendations on improving the mandate and concluding remarks." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2003. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"Every country has religious minorities. Any study of religious minorities and the protections afforded to them must also examine the significance of minorities per se. Minorities have no internationally accepted definition. Definitions are either broad and with little specificity or narrow and exclusive. Generally, two trends with regard to minority rights can be observed. On the one hand, in many countries, a comprehensive system of the legal protection of minorities has been introduced. Here the biggest problems stem from the difference between formal and informal rights. On the other hand, a number of countries have not legally committed themselves to the protection of minorities; ranging from inadequate safeguards to non-recognition of the minority. National minorities have received broad, although not well-differentiated, reporting in the international media and attention in international organisations and its impact on the discourse on religious rights have been minimal. However, minority religious rights have featured less significantly on the public agenda. The implications of the status of national minorities and religious groups are that many minorities believe that the majority group generally receive privileged status in state structures, while the minorities are viewed with suspicion. The issue of religious representation and safeguards arose within the Constitution of the Republic of Kenya ("Kenyan Constitution") where there is a recently concluded Constitutional Review Commission that had the Christian majority object to the "excessive protection" being granted to the Muslim minority. There was a huge debate as to the extent of inclusion of Sharia in the resultant draft constitution as well as the protection of fundamental principles of human rights and Islam. The question thus arises, should one apply Sharia or enshrine it in the constitution of a country, or will this involve overprotection that may lead to long-term exploitation of the law by the minority. The Arab Republic of Egypt ("Egypt") and the Republic of Kenya ("Kenya") have been chosen as case studies as they are interesting reflections of the development of states in Africa: Kenya with a Muslim minority maintaining a hold on the application of Islamic law where there is a Christian majority, while in Egypt the Copt and Shia Muslim populations are trying to assimilate into the state. Sharia is of imporance both to Kenya and Egypt. In Egypt the entire legal system is premised on the constitutional provision that Sharia is the principle source of law, thus some religious minorities in Egypt look for ways to maintain their identity and circumvent the application of Sharia provisions. Kenya, with a Muslim religious minority, is grappling with the concept of Sharia and how far it should apply to Muslims in a country. Thus these two countries have an inverse mirror image problem of each other as between the two major world religouns, Christianity and Islam. ... Chapter one sets out the content of the research, identifies the problem and applies the methodology. Chapter two discusses the international and regional law on religious minorities with a regional emphasis on African and the Arab region. Chapter three discusses the Islamic law on religious minorities, both Muslim minorities in non-Muslim states and non-Muslim minorities in Muslim states. Chapter four will focus on case studies comparing the protection accorded to the Muslims in Kenya with the Copts in Egypt, and analysing the extent to which Kenya and Egpyt have complied with international and regional law. Chapter five will set out recommendations and conclusions." -- Introduction. / Prepared under the supervision of Dr. Naz Modirzadeh at the Department of Political Sciences, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, The American University in Cairo, Egypt / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2004. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"The relevance of social and economic rights to societal welfare and well-being need not be overemphasised. The quality of life enjoyed by the citizenry is directly related to the level of enjoyment of social and economic rights in any particular country. However, the enjoyment of social and economic rights is, in turn, largely predicated on the manner in which national resources are managed and directed towards obligations raised by social and economic rights. It is axiomatic, therefore, to devise a framework that ensures that managers of public resources operate within an environment where their actions in relation to the management of national resources are governed by transparency and accountability. In the light of the above, this study explores the relationship that exist between the social trust concept and leadership roles, particularly in as far as duty bearer accountability for social and economic rights is concerned. The study argues that social trust based devices can be used to enhance duty bearer accountability in relation to social and economic rights and that such increased duty bearer accountability will automatically serve to better the welfare of the citizenry. The viability of recognising and enforcing social trust based accountability mechanisms is highlighted by exploring its relevance to Malawi and Uganda. The crux of the study is that public functionaries must always be amenable to censure by the citizenry if diligence is to be infused in the performance of their duties and the social trust concept offers adept mechansisms for achieving this." -- Abstract. This study consists of five chapters. Chapter one provides the context and foundation of the study. Chapter two is devoted to explaining the nature and scope of the social trust concept and how it can validly, if at all, be extended into the public law realm. Chapter two also expounds on some basic concepts employed in the study. Chapter three is aimed at providing and understanding of leadership roles and explaining their relevance to social economic rights. Briefly put, chapter three explores the interface between social economic rights and social trust based leadership roles. Chapter four discusses the benefits of revitalising a social trust based conception of leadership roles particularly by highlighting why Malawi and Uganda need social trust based leadership roles. The chapter also outlines how the benefits of a revitalised duty bearer accountability can be realised. Chapter five will present the study's conclusions and recommendations." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2005. / Prepared under the supervision of Dr. Ben Twinomugisha at the Faculty of Law, Makerere University, Uganda / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"The enjoyment of all human rights by all persons is the ultimate horizon of democracy. It is generally admitted that democratic societies are less likely to violate human rights. The good human rights records of these societies can be justified, among others, by the promotion of a strong legal culture, which provides procedural avenues for allocating responsibility for human rights violations. Thus, the protection of human rights follows from the functions of law in society, and the nature of human rights claims. At the national level, human rights are protected by both domestic and international mechanisms. Therefore, the human rights claims should be based on violations of either domestic law or relevant provisions of operational international human rights instruments. However, most of the time this is not the case, especially in Africa. Many African states have ratified several international human rights instruments, but the record of the way the latter are applied in their respective judicial systems remains very poor. This study aims to analyse the case of Burundi, one of these state whose judicial system only rarely applies international human rights instruments in spite of the importance devoted to them by the Constitution. It must be understood that international human rights as a source of law will be referred to, in this study, both as a source of rights and as a source of interpretation of domestic human righs instruments such as the Bill of Rights. ... Chapter one will set out the content of the research, identify the problem and outline the methodology. Chapter two will focus on the status of international law in domestic legal systems. It will highlight the theories that have been used to determine the relationship between international and domestic law in general. Chapter three will analyse on basis of some samples of cases how the Burundian courts interpret and apply international human rights instruments. Chapte four discusses the role played by the Burundian lawyers in the enforcement of these instruments. Chapter five will draw [a] conclusion and recommendations." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2005. / Prepared under the supervision of Professor Grace Patrick Tumwine-Mukubwa at the Faculty of Law, Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"The protection of the rights of sexual minorities in many countries in Africa is a controversial issue. It is not unusual to find newspaper reports on gross violations suffered by this minority group. Gays and lesbians are victims of violence, sometimes resulting in death. Sexual minorities in Africa are often confronted with government actions such as those of the Nigerian government that recently submitted to the parliament a bill to make provisions for the prohibition of relationships between persons of the same sex, celebration of marriage, registration of gay clubs and societies, and publicity of same sex sexual relationships. On the other hand, on the same continent, the South African Constitutional Court recently held that the denial of legal recognition for same-sex marriages was unconstitutional. The question that begs here is: why this state of affairs? In view of the situtation described above, this study intends to highlight the factors that have brought the continent to this point and give an analysis of the challenges and prospects faced in the protection of the rights of sexual minorities. The issue that will be addressed, therefore, is whether the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights is interpreted to include at least some protection against discrimination of sexual minorities." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2006. / Prepared under the supervision of Prof. Pierre de Vos at the Faculty of Law, University of the Western Cape / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"Children's participation in armed conflict is one of the worst [forms] of child labour and a violation in itself. It is an extensive violation of international humanitarian and human rights law. There is increasing awareness about the variety of roles played by girls in fighting forces. They are abducted and forced to be sexual slaves, cooks, [to] clean, act as porters, loot, and [be] 'wives' to combatants. Notwithstanding, Veale observes that there are still a few gender-based issues of the differential experiences of male and female children who have been involved in military units. Although they play all these roles, they have received scanty attention during the reintegration process as opposed to male child soldiers. Mckay and her colleagues argue that [the] majority of reports, internaitonal campaigns, and initiatives continue to use the generic term 'child soldiers' which most often mean 'boys'. They do not identify differential impacts for boys and girls before, during or after armed conflicts. Mazurana found in another study that between 1990 and 2000, underaged girls participated in armed conflicts in a minimum of 32 countries as child soldeirs or military support forces. ... Northern Uganda qualifies [as] a case study because it has been in conflict between 1996 [and] 2006. It is estimated that there are 70 to 80 percent of child combatants with girls making up 30 percent. Disarmament and demobilisation is carried out by Uganda's People Defence Force (UPDF) working together with some United Nations (UN) humanitarian bodies, then NGOs and community leaders in turn work on the reintegration of the returnees. However, the reintegration process in Uganda is a-typical when compared to that of Sierra Leone, and most often does not take into consideration the special needs of female child soldiers. ... My focus will therefore be on Northern Uganda, but reference will be made to Sierra Leone as precedent where the context permits. This will be relevant for any reintegration procudure that Uganda adopts after the war. ... Chapter one: introduction and background. Chapter two: investigating the recruitment and impact of conflict on child soldiers in general and female child soldiers in particular. This chapter will be divided into two parts. Part one sets the stage by giving a brief account of the conflict in Northern Uganda and Sierra Leone. Part two identifies the significant environmental factors, but not sufficient conditions that cause children in general, and girls in particular, to join armed groups and the impact it has on female child soldiers. Chapter three: legal guarantee of the right to reintegration - by provision and implication. This chapter outlines and analyses treaties that have influenced and circumscribed the policies and practices for the reintegration of female child soldiers. It also looks at those that provide for reintegration by implication. This chapter will also examine the rights-based approach as base for reintegration processes. Case law will be included. Chapter four: comprehensive analysis of effective socio-economic reintegration of female child soldiers. This chapter will examine the factors that influence successful reintegration. It will portray the half-baked approach of reintegration that is obvious in the case study. The role of international agencies, NGOs, civil society and other actors will be discussed as a platform for successful reintegration. Furthermore, some decisions at the Special Court of Sierra Leone (SCSL) will be discussed. Chapter five: conclusion and recommendations." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2006. / Prepared under the supervision of Mr. Angelo Matusse at the Faculdade de Direito, Universidade Eduardo Mondlane, Mozambique / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"In response to President Kabah's request of June 2000, the United Nations Security Council called on the Secretary-General to negotiate an agreement with the government of Sierra Leone for the creation of a special court for Sierra Leone (hereafter SCSL), to investigate the atrocities committed within the country, by Resolution 1315 of 14 August 2000. Under the agreement concluded in February 2001, the SCSL has jurisdiction over crimes against humanity, war crimes and other serious violations of international humanitarian law committed since November 1996. The author assesses in detail the efficacy of the SCSL in dispensing justice up to date. The author concludes that, although the SCSL has accomplished much, it has shortcomings and faces changes that hamper the attainment of its objectives. ... This study is divided into five chapters. Chapter one provides the context in which the study is set, the focus and objectives of the study, its significance and other preliminary issues, including a statement of the problem and the literature review. Analysis of the conflict in Sierra Leone are necessary to grasp the graveness and the nature of the human rights violations and to understand the nature and extent of justice already meted out. Chapter two focuses particularly on the historical background of the conflict and the reasons that necessitate the establishment of the SCSL. The SCSL was established specifically to respond to human rights abuses committed during the civil war in Sierra Leone. Chapter three examines the major achievements of the Court in dispensing justice, and chapter four identifies the shortcomings and the challenges that confront the Court in its aim to fulfil its mandate." -- Chapter one. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2006. / Prepared under the supervision of Professor Lovell Fernandez, Faculty of Law, University of the Western Cape / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

"First, this dissertation proposes to explore the practice of amnesties in dealing with violations of human rights vis-à-vis the obligation of states to punish and to prosecute gross violations of human rights and to guarantee effective remedies for victims. Secondly, it seeks to inquire, for purposes of meeting the first objective, into the validity of amnesties in international law with specific reference to the African Charter. Thirdly, on the strength of a selected case studies: South Africa and Moçambique, and informed by relevant jurisprudence drawn from the Inter-American human rights system and elsewhere, a critique informative of the recommendations as to how the African Court should deal with cases arising out of such amnesty situations will be attempted. Equally, similar reference will be made, albeit in an abridged way, to how amnesties could be dealt with at the political levels of the African Union (AU). Fourthly, the dissertation will inquire into why amnesties, which have been used to advance utilitarian ends of the communal good (national reconciliation) thereby ‘trumping individuals’ rights’, cannot at the same time, be so fashioned as to reconcile these especially relating to effective remedies for violations of human rights the amnesty seeks to address. Fifthly, in drawing on the foregoing, this study will, by way of recommendations, seek to outline criteria or conditionalities upon which amnesty should, if ever, be granted. ... The study consists of five chapters. Chapter one will provide the context in which the study is set. It highlights the basis and structure of the study. Chapter two endeavours to outline some of the basic concepts central to the study; amnesty, pardon as instruments of national reconciliation and the various avenues through which these has been effected in the past. In the main, the chapter attempts a problematisation of the concept of amnesty by which its validity and place in international law will be examined. Chapter three outlines the approaches to amnesty in South Africa and Moçambique and the countervailing state obligations to ensure rights protected in human rights instruments: to prosecute and punish violators and the rights of victims and their relatives to effective remedies. In the case of South Africa, the right to effective remedies is discussed within the context of the decision of the South African constitutional court in AZAPO. Chapter four attempts to grapple with the possibility of bringing a case before the African Court of Human Rights and how this case may, and should be decided in light of existing decisions of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and available comparative jurisprudence on the subject. Chapter five will consist of a summary of the presentation and the conclusions drawn from the entire study. It will also make some recommendations as to how amnesty should be dealt with both at political level (AU) and at the level of the African Court in relation to human rights violations. In furtherance of this, it attempts an outline of directive criteria that should be applied." -- Chapter 1. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2004. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

This study will look at the possible interpretations and implementation methods that a state may adopt in accordance with internationally recognised standards and best practices. This will be in light of the special context of Africa and specifically as regards the disposition of women in the HIV and AIDS pandemic. The author critically analyse article 14(1)(e)of the African Women’s Protocol and establish possible interpretations that best advance the public health goal of arresting the spread of HIV in Africa / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2008. / A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Law University of Pretoria, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Masters of Law (LLM in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa). Prepared under the supervision of Dr. Patrice E. Vahard of the Faculty of Law, Addis Ababa University / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/ / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

This study focuses on the right of access to justice and the factors that limit the realisation of the right. It also examines the concept of legal aid, its importance and then discusses the legal aid schemes that have been developed in Tanzania and Ghana and how they promote the right of access to justice. The author also compares the legal aid schemes of Tanzania and Ghana and how the legal aid schemes could be improved to further promote the right of access to justice / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2008. / A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Law University of Pretoria, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Masters of Law (LLM in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa). Prepared under the supervision of Dr Kwadwo Appiagyei-Atua of the Faculty of Law, University of Ghana, Legon / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/ / Centre for Human Rights / LLM