Who Represents the Chancellor of the University of Addis Ababa, the Vice-President Of

SPEECH OF HE ALPHA OUMAR KONARÉ, PRESIDENT OF THE COMMISSION OF THE AFRICAN UNION AT THE CLOSING CEREMONY OF THE 15TH AFRICAN HUMAN RIGHTS MOOT COURT COMPETITION IN THE PLENARY HALL OF THE AFRICAN UNION HEADQUARTERS, ADDIS ABABA ON 2 SEPTEMBER 2006.

[Mr Taddese Lencho, Dean, Faculty of Law] …who represents the Chancellor of the University of Addis Ababa, the Vice-President of the Federal Supreme Court of Ethiopia, … for organising this very prestigious ceremony.

Prof Heyns, Director of the Centre for Human Rights, it is already the 15th competition; 14 years have passed since you initiated this competition in 1992. You have succeeded by extending this competition from Southern Africa to the entire continent: starting at the Centre, in partnership with seven other universities, you set up a Masters’ programme in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa; and, of course, who is not familiar with the African Human Rights Law Reports and the Human Rights Law in Africa series, both of which the Centre launched.

Beyond the Centre’s own successes you have made the African Human Rights Moot Court Competition the most important African annual gathering on human rights issues in Africa. Thanks to this Competition, human rights is now included in university curricula. And through this competition you have also created a network of African academics, students and practitioners interested in human rights issues. More important still, thanks to you there now exists a human rights culture and jurisprudence.

I wish to thank you, Sir, as well as all your colleagues at the Centre for Human Rights of the University of Pretoria, and of course everybody who has helped you organise this competition. Of course, I am also referring to those who have come to the 15th Competition from 61 universities in 29 African countries. Further than that, I am referring to many thousands more: I see that over the past 14 years almost 7,000 people have participated in the preliminary rounds and that there have been close to 1,400 finalists. And those you honour today contributed to the success of this event.

Dean, Mr. President, Madam Commissioner, Prof Heyns, all these prize-winners and all those who help you in this event force us, at the African Union, to continue endeavouring for the promotion of human and peoples’ rights as stated in the Constitutive Act of the African Union. As the OAU became the African Union, there is no doubt that the continent’s political and legal environment in Africa evolved simultaneously. Naturally there are gaps, weaknesses and issues that still need to be dealt with. Indisputably, Africa is heading towards rule of law and good governance. Yet perseverance is needed because these rights are not given: they are rights that have been fought for and won, otherwise they would not have withstood the test of time and the test of law.

The African Union has chosen as its principal focus the defence of human and peoples’ rights, the promotion of good governance and building the respect for the rule of law. In this respect, it is no secret how dedicated we are to Africa becoming a land of peace and security, to Africa becoming a place where life is sacrosanct. Among our core values is gender equality – an important issue amongst those, which you are fighting for today. Other important values are to stop the following: seizing political power by force, assassinations, torture, acts of terrorism and impunity; and to make sure that serious violations on our continent never happen again. I am referring to the arms and the legs cut in Sierra Leone; I am thinking of violence against women and children. Today, our role is to persevere. We now have important instruments that you all know and that should serve as your references: the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights; the African Children’s Charter and the African Charter’s Protocol on the Rights of Women. Besides these charters and protocols, since 1981 we have the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, whose 25th birthday we celebrated in Banjul last July. You are equally aware that in Banjul, we also helped the judges of the African Human Rights Court settle in. Furthermore, you know that, in line with NEPAD and its values, we have set up the African Peer Review Mechanism. And you should know that the evaluation criteria for the peer review mechanism places great emphasis on children’s rights.

Dean, Mr. President, Madam Commissioner, Professor Heyns, my dear friends: I only wish to tell you that the Africa of tomorrow bears the flag of human rights; that the Africa of tomorrow rests on women and men who are determined to fight for the value of humanness, the pride of being human, the honour of being human and the duty to be human. This is what building our continent will cost, and only then will we be able to move faster in uniting Africa. We understood, as the OAU became the African Union, that only within a united Africa can there be peace.

Our most important dream for the months and years to come is to hasten the integration process and that every one of us, strengthened by nationality and citizenship, should be proud of being a citizen of Africa, citizens of Africa endeavouring for a Pan-African nation, endeavouring for a country that tomorrow we might call the United States of Africa. No doubt, some will call us dreamers. Yet this dream is already in place and will inevitably come true if we want to play our role on this earth, if we want to be equal to others, if we want to fight, and I mean fight, poverty.

Tomorrow we will have to ensure that the issues you have studied thus far serve to provide answers to further questions. I am referring to new rights: the right to education, the right to health, the right to food, the right to water and the right to a healthy environment. Parallel to these new rights, however, are essential issues that affect us, that concern us and that we ought not to avoid: the death penalty in Africa, when all our texts state that the right to life cannot be violated. Another essential issue is the right to freedom of movement, the right to settle in Africa. If these rights are not realised, our progress towards further union will be hampered. And this progress must hasten so that we may obtain our title: citizens of Africa. Yet we will never be citizens of Africa if we do not become accomplished people first, people who take responsibility for their actions.

Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for your patience. My wish is that this competition becomes ever more successful; that this competition reaches further than the 40 countries participating today, that all 53 countries in Africa play a part in this competition and that this competition contributes to the success of the law in Africa, to the success of the rule of law in Africa in order for Africa to become a land of work, a land of solidarity, a land of tolerance, and a land of justice. Africa, our common nation, should be a land of [great] men and women. Thank you. Thank you very much.