Abstract:
For decades, widespread poverty and increasing inequality continue to wreak social
deprivation and diminish the quality of life across Commonwealth African states.
Given the redistributive value of socio-economic rights, the need to ensure their
implementation as a relevant strategy to improve peoples’ general wellbeing is
unquestionable.National Human Rights Commissions (NHRCs) are uniquely relevant
to advance state implementation of socio-economic rights. These institutions function
in most Commonwealth African states, yet contemporary scholarship has hardly
noticed the relevance and practical efforts of NHRCs in advancing the
implementation of socio-economic rights. To fill this gap, this study evaluates the role
and effectiveness of NHRCs in advancing domestic implementation of socioeconomic
rights in Commonwealth African states, using the National Human Rights
Commissions (NHRCs) of Nigeria, South Africa and Uganda as case studies.
Employing a mix of valuable data generated through primary and secondary sources
and interviews with relevant stakeholders, including senior members and staff of the
focused NHRCs and representatives of relevant NGOs, the study concludes that
NHRCs are strategically valuable institutions for advancing the domestic
implementation of socio-economic rights in Commonwealth African states. However,
the ability of NHRCs to play an effective role in this regard is predicated on four
background factors: the explicit provision of socio-economic rights as justiciable
guarantees in the constitutional framework of states; the granting of explicit legal or
constitutional mandate on socio-economic rights to NHRCs; strengthening the
institutional architecture of NHRCs and the ability of the courts and parliament to
adequately support and supplement the efforts these institutions. Therefore, the study
recommends the need to ensure that these factors are provided in the legal culture and
practice of Commonwealth African states in relation to the legal status of socioeconomic
rights and mandates of NHRCs to advance the domestic implementation of
these rights.
