Human rights lawyer Femi Falana has urged the governments of Nigeria and Ghana to take South Africa before the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights over renewed xenophobic attacks on African migrants, arguing that only the continental court has the authority to compel Pretoria to compensate victims.
The senior advocate of Nigeria dismissed plans by Abuja and Accra to pursue the matter through the African Union, describing the approach as ineffective and incapable of delivering legal redress.
“The decision of the Governments of Nigeria and Ghana to report South Africa to the African Union is completely diversionary and time-wasting,” Falana said in a statement on Sunday.
“The African Union lacks the competence to direct the Ramaphosa regime to pay compensation to the victims of xenophobic attacks.”
His intervention follows reports that South Africa had rejected Nigeria’s request for compensation for citizens forced to flee the country after renewed violence targeting foreign nationals, abandoning businesses, investments and other property in the process.
The Nigerian government had earlier indicated it would seek compensation for affected citizens, while the acting high commissioner to South Africa, Alexander Ajayi, said officials were documenting abandoned businesses and assets to support negotiations with Pretoria.
Falana, however, condemned South Africa’s reported refusal to consider compensation, describing it as “sheer insensitivity”.
“Out of sheer insensitivity, the Cyril Ramaphosa administration has turned round to reject Nigeria’s request for compensation for its citizens who were forced to abandon their businesses and properties after fleeing renewed xenophobic attacks,” he said.
South African authorities have reportedly argued that many of those affected were living in the country illegally, a claim disputed by the migrants concerned.
Falana said Nigeria, Ghana and other African states whose citizens had been killed or attacked should instead institute proceedings before the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights in Arusha, Tanzania, seeking both emergency measures to halt further violence and substantial compensation for victims.
“Apart from seeking provisional measures to stop further attacks, the governments of Nigeria and Ghana should pray the Court to award aggravated damages against the South African Government,” he said.
The lawyer argued that the treatment of African migrants breached Article 12 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which prohibits the mass expulsion of non-nationals except in accordance with due process.
He also criticised remarks by South African president Cyril Ramaphosa urging migrants to respect the country’s “laws and traditions”, arguing that such rhetoric risked legitimising hostility towards foreign nationals rather than confronting it.
Drawing comparisons with South Africa’s case against Israel before the International Court of Justice over alleged genocide in Gaza, Falana said Pretoria should itself be held accountable under regional human rights mechanisms for failing to protect African migrants within its borders.
He also called on President Bola Tinubu’s administration to strengthen Nigeria’s commitment to the African Court by recognising its jurisdiction to hear petitions from individuals and civil society organisations under Article 34(6) of the court’s protocol.
According to Falana, such recognition would enable victims of xenophobic attacks and other serious human rights abuses across the continent to seek justice directly before the court.
“If Nigeria had recognised the competence of the court, victims of xenophobic attacks and other gross abuses of human rights in South Africa and other African countries would have been able to seek legal redress, including payment of compensatory damages,” he said.
“We are therefore compelled to call on the Bola Tinubu administration to enable aggrieved citizens to access the African Court.”
Relations between Nigeria and South Africa have periodically come under strain following repeated waves of xenophobic violence over the past decade. Attacks in 2015, 2019 and subsequent years resulted in deaths, the destruction of businesses and the evacuation of hundreds of Nigerians, prompting diplomatic protests from Abuja.
The latest reports of renewed attacks have again displaced thousands of African migrants, including Nigerians and Ghanaians, amid growing anti-immigrant sentiment, reopening longstanding tensions between two of Africa’s largest economies.
