Human Rights and Disability A Manual for National Human Rights Institutions Network of African Human Rights Institutions In March 2016, the Network of African National Human Rights Institutions (NANHRI),204 with the support of the Swedish Development Cooperation and the Roaul Wallenberg Institute, published Protecting, Promoting and Monitoring the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: A Guide for African National Human Rights Institutions.205 The resource will be extremely useful for NHRIs when monitoring the human rights situation of people with disabilities within their counties and interacting with the regional and international human rights mechanisms, including the CRPD Committee. In its 2015–2019 Strategic Plan, NANHRI specifically mentions work on persons with disabilities as one of its strategic priorities for the region, albeit under the heading of ‘vulnerable groups’.206 Commonwealth Secretariat The Commonwealth Secretariat, based in London, has arranged a number of meetings for NHRIs on disability issues. Many NHRIs in countries attached to the Commonwealth (54 countries in all) have done extensive work on disability issues, especially in Australia and New Zealand. The Commonwealth Secretariat Disabled Persons’ Forum has delivered training on the Convention in six of its Member States. In 2012, it held a seminar with 14 Member States on ‘promoting inclusive education and sustainable employment for persons with disabilities’. It has also published a very impressive book on inclusive education.207 6.2. DISABILITY AND HUMAN INSTRUMENTS IN THE AFRICAN UNION The African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, also known as the Banjul Charter,208 is an international human rights instrument that seeks to promote and protect human rights and basic freedoms in the African continent. Oversight and interpretation of the Charter is the task of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. A protocol to the Charter was subsequently adopted in 1998 whereby an African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights was to be created. The protocol came into effect on 25 January 2005. Article 2 of the Charter concerns the right to freedom from discrimination. Although it does not mention disability specifically, the Charter prohibits discrimination on the ground of “any status”. Article 3 of the Charter concerns equal recognition before the law and equal entitlement to protection by the law. The Charter also highlights the need to pay particular attention to the right to development and to the fact that civil and political rights cannot be disassociated from economic, social and cultural rights, reflecting the approach of the UN CRPD. In 2014, a draft Protocol on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in Africa209 was prepared by a Working Group on older persons and persons with disabilities, under the auspices of the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights. The draft Protocol broadly embodies the articles of the UN CRPD, while “providing an African context to rights of persons with disabilities” by grounding it in the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and referencing the draft Protocol on the Rights of Older Persons. The introduction to the Protocol says it “should not undermine the letter and spirit of the 2006 United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). It therefore draws from and is inspired by the CRPD without necessarily adopting all the CRPD’s detail.” 82 204 More information on NANHRI is available at www.nanhri.org. 205 Available at www.nanhri.org/reports. 206 See more at www.nanhri.org/1088-2. 207 R. Rieser, Implementing Inclusive Education: A Commonwealth Guide to Implementing Article 24 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, 2012 (2nd edition). 208 Text available at www.achpr.org/instruments/achpr. 209 Text available at www.achpr.org/news/2014/04/d121.