You will agree with us that many societies in Africa lack access to effective channels to communicate grievances and seek improvements of service delivery. In normal times, existing grievance mechanisms, even within the African Human Rights System, not to mention national level, are too often inaccessible to marginalized communities and individuals, who, as key recipients of the AU and government’s social policies, are the ones who should be heard the most. Furthermore, there are millions of people all across the continent who often do not have the means and capacity to effectively monitor and document violations of their rights to legal entitlements, or to identify systemic gaps in service delivery.

That is where we come in: we monitor what the AU, especially its Working Group on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and its Member States are doing to promote and protect ESC rights. We are committed to advancing a wider understanding of the AU, its RECs, institutions and programs and their critical security, political, economic and human rights issues of the twenty-first century and their potential resolution. Working with partner organisations and individuals, we develop effective and accessible strategies for monitoring essential services that they communities legally entitled to, seek redressal of individual right violations, and, at a collective level, advocate for systemic improvements in the delivery of services.

Our ambitious goal at AU Watch is to envision a rights-based Africa and catalyze action towards it—taking into account the confluence of political, economic, climate, and health crises we now face. Our strategy sets out the steps we are taking over the next five years to tackle the common root of these crises: the unjust distribution of wealth and power—within and between countries—that fuels inequality and deprives millions of Africans of their rights.