The rule of exhaustion of domestic remedies in the African system of human rights protection

The practice of application and interpretation of the rule of exhaustion of local remedies by the African monitoring bodies in the field of human rights, in particular by the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, not only complies with approaches elaborated by other international judicial and quasi-judicial human rights bodies, but also develops them to a considerable extent. Following other international institutions the monitoring bodies of the African human rights system have established that they cannot be regarded as courts of the first instance, the mechanism of international control is subsidiary with respect to national one, and the application of the requirement of exhaustion of internal procedures shall not be carried out using formal rules. At the same time, the African monitoring bodies in the area of human rights have significantly expanded a list of exceptions to the admissibility criterion under examination by including mass and gross human rights violations, indigent situation of applicants, as well as fear for applicants to be prosecuted while invoking internal procedures.

About the author: Roman S. Moroz – Master of law, D.U. Sciences Politiqueset Etudes Européennes, Université Montesquieu – Bordeaux IV.