The African continent is endowed with vast natural resources of minerals, such as cobalt, diamonds, gold, bauxite, iron, platinum, silver, uranium and mineral oil. Oil is unequally distributed in the continent, with some countries, such as Cameroon, Chad, Congo Brazzaville, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and South Africa, being particularly well endowed. These natural resources can help accelerate development on the continent, especially in Gabon and South Africa if used strategically. This dissertation gives an overview of the international instruments, which play a key role in petroleum legislation and development. At the global level, the international legal instruments related to the permanent sovereignty over natural resources (PSNR), such as the 1962 Resolution 1803 (XVII) on Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources indicates that States have the rights to exploit freely national resources and wealth, use and dispose their natural resources for the realisation of their economic development in accordance with their national interest. The PSNR must be exercised in line with indigenous peoples’ rights and the respect of rules concerning the expropriation. At the African level, with regard to the right to the State to exploit freely natural resources, the African (Banjul) Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights of 1981 has similar provisions as the Resolution 1803. The African (Banjul) Charter specifies that no peoples can be deprived of the right to dispose their natural resources. The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights is tasked to interpret the African (Banjul) Charter. The Resolution on Human Rights-Based Approach to Natural Resources and Governance has also indicated principles in relation to the governance of natural resources. At the regional level, the Constitutive Treaty of the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CAEMC) of 1994 and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Treaty of 1992 do not provide explicit provisions relative to the PSNR and the management of natural resources. Therefore, it is important to examine if at the national level, the domestic instruments of both States deal with the PSNR.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:nmmu/vital:10302 |
| Date | January 2015 |
| Creators | Massamba-Animbo, Stephane |
| Publisher | Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Faculty of Law |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis, Masters, LLM |
| Format | vii, 157 leaves, pdf |
| Rights | Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University |
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