Academic Lead: Dr Ornette D Clennon
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1st Session of the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent Dec 5 – 8, 2022
3rd session of the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent 16 – 19 April 2024
Here is a summary of the event.
Representing MaCTRI, here is Dr Ornette D Clennon’s accepted recommendations (written statement: here) for development of the Chairperson’s Preparatory Document for the Draft UN Declaration on the Promotion and Full Respect of the Human Rights of People of African Descent
It is also important to note how our recommendation for an article 4 that proposes how it should outline how the Human Rights of People of African Descent will be protected and enforced, is reflected by a similar recommendation from the Balanta B’urassa History & Genealogy Society in America who advocate:
On April 5th, this forum received a Mandate from the Afro Descendant People that was signed by 248 individuals and organizations from over twenty countries, many of them in this room today. The mandate laid out the firm basis of this forum’s ability to make such a request [i.e. an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice on our status as prisoners of war under the Geneva Convention] under UN Charter Article 96, Article 65 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice, and Resolution 75/314 establishing this forum.
Resolution 75/314 specifically states that this forum can “request the preparation and dissemination of information by the United Nations system on issues relating to people of African descent . . .”
Update
The UN Permanent Forum on People of African Descent (PFPAD) published their Conclusions and Recommendations for the 2nd Session here.
From our recommendations below:
In Article 1 the word indigenous needs to be urgently added to the definition of People of African Descent in so doing, clarifying the centrality of Continental Africans to the forum and its remit but also allowing the borrowing of article 37 from the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples that calls for enforcement of treaties
We also need a new article 4 that outlines how those rights will be protected and enforced since the Forum is supposed to be a step towards a legally binding instrument on the promotion of our human rights.
Article 15 about reparations currently has no legal foundations without an explanatory article 4 setting out the enforcements of our rights. Any calls for states to build systems of redress to racial inequalities are marred by the “lack of legal and other institutional support mechanisms” that should be introduced in this new article 4
The Conclusions and Recommendations took the above into their own considerations here:
The Permanent Forum welcomes with special interest the contributions made by civil society that the elaboration of the Declaration include, inter alia: cultural and linguistic rights such as rights to preserve cultural heritage, native languages and ancestral knowledge; the right to self-determination; collective rights of peoples and communities of African descent; the right of peoples of African descent to their lands, territories and resources; rights of indigenous peoples of African descent to free, prior and informed consent in relation to decisions that affect their rights and territories; the right to family
integrity for families of African descent; the right to justice and reparations.The Permanent Forum reiterates that while the full and effective implementation of the ICERD and the DDPA remain the cornerstone in addressing racial discrimination against people of African descent, there is a further need for comprehensive recognition, monitoring, and effective address of systemic and structural racial discrimination—at the local, national, regional and global levels.
And here:
The Permanent Forum recognizes that there is no adequate legal mechanism in dealing with reparations claims for the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans, colonialism, hundreds of years of African enslavement, and the multiplicity of related injuries and damages to Africans and people of African descent in the various countries of the world.
The Permanent Forum reiterates its recommendation to promote an advisory
opinion from the International Court of Justice on the legal question of reparatory justice for histories and legacies of colonialism and enslavement. Member States could also encourage that such opinions be made by other competent legal bodies, such as the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and the European Court of Human Rights.
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