From Citizen Voices to African Mechanisms: Bringing Sahelian Concerns up to the ACHPR
Ahead of the 89th Ordinary Session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR), scheduled to take place in Dakar from 12 to 21 October 2026, AfricTivistes is launching a citizen consultation to bring African human rights protection mechanisms closer to the realities experienced by people across the Sahel.
Through its communities, notably Sahel Activistes, Sahel Résilience and the CitizenLabs, AfricTivistes will gather the experiences, concerns and recommendations of citizens, activists and human rights defenders/champions. These contributions will help bring to the fore concerns directly rooted in the experiences of communities.
The consultation comes at a time when, in several countries across the Sahel and West Africa, citizens and civil society actors are working in contexts marked by profound political and institutional transformations, shrinking civic space, restrictions on public freedoms, challenges to citizen participation, and growing difficulties in protecting human rights defenders. It will therefore focus on civic space, fundamental freedoms, digital rights, access to information, the protection of populations, and access to African human rights protection mechanisms. Particular attention will be paid to the challenges faced by citizens and human rights defenders in exercising their rights.
The aim is not only to document problems, but also to identify existing responses, their limitations and the improvements needed. Contributions will therefore be structured around a simple approach: circumstances, concerns, existing response, gaps and recommendations.
This consultation builds on the first phase, during which AfricTivistes launched a pan-African online citizen consultation to gather ideas and recommendations from African citizens on democratic governance. This participatory exercise/activity addressed key issues such as freedom of expression, respect for constitutions, presidential term limits, and the participation of young people and women in political institutions.
As far as figures are concerned, the first phase involved:
- 5 topics addressed
- More than 60 contributions collected
- 5 webinars organised
- 1 synthesis report produced
- 2 languages used for data collection (French and English)
A Pluralistic Collection Process, with the ACHPR in Sight
As part of this new phase, contributions will be collected through webinars, community consultations, digital campaigns and an online platform, before being reviewed and summarised. A report summarising the main concerns and recommendations will then be forwarded to the ACHPR.
In Dakar, this process will result in a dedicated forum presenting the findings and facilitating dialogue with the ACHPR, civil society, activists and community leaders. The aim is to enhance sustainable citizen participation and bridge the gap between realities on the ground and African human rights protection mechanisms.
Your experience matters. Share your concerns, tell your story and put forward your recommendations to ensure that voices from the communities are heard
