On February 6th 2026, a coalition of African civil society organisations took a significant step in the evolution of environmental and human rights law on the continent. Supported by a collection of organisations based in Angola, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa and Uganda, an application was submitted to the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights to participate as amicus curiae in a landmark climate-related advisory opinion.
The application responds to a request by the Pan African Lawyers’ Union (PALU), which has asked the Court to clarify the obligations of African States in relation to the climate change crisis. The request recognises the existential threat climate change poses to the fulfilment of human rights across Africa and calls for a rights-based response grounded in the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.
What makes this submission particularly significant is its explicit and carefully reasoned introduction of Earth jurisprudence and the Rights of Nature into the Court’s consideration.
Why this moment matters
Africa is already experiencing some of the most severe impacts of the climate crisis: biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse, droughts, floods, and food insecurity. These impacts disproportionately affect communities who have contributed least to the problem, and they threaten not only individual rights but the survival of cultures, livelihoods, and future generations.
The application argues that human rights cannot be meaningfully protected unless the ecological systems that sustain life are also protected. In other words, a healthy climate, functioning ecosystems, and thriving biodiversity are not optional environmental concerns – they are the preconditions for human dignity, wellbeing, and justice.
This perspective challenges legal frameworks that treat nature as property or a resource, and instead proposes a shift toward recognising other-than-human beings and ecosystems as legal subjects with inherent rights to exist, thrive, and regenerate.
An African legal vision rooted in ancient wisdom
Crucially, the submission does not present Rights of Nature as a foreign or imported idea. On the contrary, it demonstrates that Earth-centred legal thinking is deeply aligned with African philosophies, customary law, and ancestral worldviews.
Across diverse African cultures runs a shared understanding: that humans are part of a wider community of life, bound by relationships of reciprocity and responsibility. Philosophies such as Ubuntu and Ukama express this relational ethic – affirming that human wellbeing arises from harmonious coexistence with other beings and the land itself.
The application argues that Earth jurisprudence offers a contemporary legal language through which these ancient understandings can be recognised, incorporated, and applied within modern African legal systems.
Linking human rights, climate obligations, and Nature’s rights
The submission invites the Court to interpret the African Charter in light of:
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- international environmental law (including the UNFCCC, Paris Agreement, and Convention on Biological Diversity),
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- African customary law and practices (as mandated by Article 61 of the Charter), and
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- comparative jurisprudence, including the 2025 advisory opinion of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which recognised the importance of Rights of Nature in addressing the climate emergency.
It proposes that States’ duties to protect human rights necessarily imply duties to protect ecosystems and other-than-human beings, because without ecological integrity, human rights cannot be realised.
Further the argument is put forward for an enhanced standard of State conduct – one that addresses not only the symptoms of climate change, but its root causes, and that recognises obligations owed to future generations and the Earth community as a whole.
A historic opportunity for the African Court
If admitted, this amicus curiae participation would enable the African Court to articulate a distinctly African contribution to global climate jurisprudence – one that honours ancestral wisdom, affirms ecological interdependence, and recognises Nature as a bearer of rights.
Such an opinion would not only influence climate governance across Africa, but would also resonate globally, offering a powerful example of how law can evolve to meet the scale of the ecological crises of our time.
At its heart, this submission is an act of responsibility and care: for people, for future generations, and for the living Earth that makes all rights possible.
