Browsing by Author "Madala, Sithembele"

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    African regional integration track: challenges and prospects
    (2018) Madala, Sithembele; Ordor, Ada
    Africa has been very slow in effectively implementing regional integration and trade agreements and has made little progress to achieve its stated objectives, especially the goal of eradicating poverty and promoting development. In addition, the economic integration model currently being pursued in Africa suffers from several challenges and has not achieved its goals, because of among other things, weak legal and institutional frameworks, and lack of support from ordinary African citizens and the private sector. In light of the above, this research investigate the appropriateness of this model. This research begins with the theoretical discussions of integration and identifies the existing gaps within the African regional integration process. This reveals that there are not only foundational and definitional disparities within the African regional integration process but also that Africa lacks the necessary prerequisite for any successful regional integration. In particular, this research reveals that the institutions that are mandated to accelerate regional integration process lack the necessary capacity to achieve regional integration process. The discussions of theories behind regional economic integration reveals that the understanding of regional integration in Africa are rooted in the economic understanding of regionalism with insufficient attention given to the importance of strong institutional and legal frameworks and a human centred development. Importantly, these discussions reveal that the European integration economic model that was a success in European Community has been adopted in Africa without reviewing its appropriateness for the continent. The debates of the history of African regional integration in Africa demonstrate that regional integration process is not a new phenomenon in Africa and that African leaders have always embraced integration and have perceived it as a way of addressing Africa’s social and economic challenges. Importantly, the discussions of the history demonstrate the role African leaders played in fighting colonialism and dismantling the apartheid system in South Africa. Unfortunately, these discussions also show that after independence Africa was a continent faced with many challenges. In particular, history shows that after independence African leaders gave little support to Pan Africanism which had been driving force behind decolonisation and became oppressive and in many instances, committed human rights violations against their own people. This state of affairs has led to economic development being sacrificed. The discussions of the benefits of economic integration shows that while there are benefits linked to economic integration such as the reduction of poverty and development in countries such as China, India and Thailand, for Africa is unable to deal with the challenge of poverty and underdevelopment . African countries continue to witness increasing levels of poverty and poor development while few businesses and political elites remain the main beneficiaries of the economic integration model. The analyses of the institutional and legal structures reveal that the institutions mandated with regional integration and the laws governing regional integration process are either weak or nonexistence. This is demonstrated by the slow implementation of regional projects. Even though Africa has made significant steps to facilitate its regional integration, it has been unable to deal with the challenges confronting the continent, especially the rising levels of poverty and underdevelopment. While this this research supports and approves the steps that have been adopted to facilitate regional integration and trade, nevertheless this research observes that institutions that are mandated to drive regional integration have been unable to promote African regional integration. Africa lacks the necessary infrastructure and human capacity to achieve regional integration. The research question therefore is whether the economic integration model currently being pursued in Africa under its existing framework is the appropriate model for African regional integration since it is not supported by a proper legal system and the African people and does not directly address the issues that confront ordinary African citizens? While the author observes that Africa has considerably improved its trade and strengthened its integration process, the author nevertheless concludes that the economic integration model currently being pursued in Africa is unlikely to succeed, because it does not take into account African realities and lacks the necessary prerequisites for successful economic integration.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Open Access
    Compliance with regional courts judgments in SADC in the context of regional integration in Africa
    (2025) Madala, Sithembele; Ordor, Ada
    Existing research on the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Tribunal focuses mainly on how it has interpreted its human rights jurisdiction. Extant research on the SADC occasionally notes that Zimbabwe has not complied with all the SADC Tribunal judgments issued against it, but without any detailed analysis of the actual role of the tribunal and the contributions of its decisions to human rights protection and the rule of law. Consequently, based on non- compliance with tribunal decisions by Zimbabwe, some scholars have erroneously concluded that the tribunal is ineffective. The proponents of this view theorise that the SADC Tribunal can only be effective if its judgments are complied with or if a strong enforcement system supports its judgments. Contrary to these claims, however, a growing body of literature on international adjudication shows that international courts (ICs) are important beyond measures of state compliance. Furthermore, like many ICs, the SADC Tribunal depends on the member states and SADC Summit for enforcement and compliance with its judgments. The SADC Tribunal constitutive instruments make it difficult to enforce SADC Tribunal. Another structural problem that is the fact that even when ICs interpret a coherent set of treaties, unlike a national legislator that can go back and amend the law and override the court's interpretation, it is more cumbersome or even impossible to amend the treaty that the IC interpreted especially if enough number of the parties like the court's interpretation. This is structural. Moreover, the court had a slow institutional setup which suggests that it was never intended to function as a supranational court but to act as an advisory organ to the SADC by giving advisory opinions on contentious disputes. This also explains why the SADC Summit is the final arbiter and principal organ with the power to enforce tribunal judgments against recalcitrant state. The other structural problem facing an international court such as the SADC Tribunal is that even if interpret coherent set of treaties, it cannot amend domestic laws or override domestic courts interpretation since SADC Treaty and Tribunal Protocol does not create supranational legal system and supranational courts such as the European Court of Justice (ECJ) which has the power to override domestic laws and domestic court judgments that violate fundamental European Union (EU) laws. Therefore, the challenge with enforcement of tribunal judgments is structural and cannot be blamed on the tribunal. This thesis aims to evaluate the benefits and legal value of the SADC Tribunal beyond state compliance measures. It identifies and evaluates the multiple roles and functions of the tribunal, examines how it has performed these roles and assesses whether it has achieved its goals. This by no means suggests that compliance with the SADC Tribunal judgments is not essential. Rather, the thesis demonstrates that compliance is of limited use in explaining the tribunal's utility and importance. The research adopts goal-based and institutional design approaches to measure the utility of the SADC Tribunal by focusing on the institutional design of ICs and the multiple roles they perform to measure their institutional effectiveness. Drawing heavily on these approaches, the thesis concludes that the SADC Tribunal has performed its roles successfully owing to its institutional design, ratione materiae (subject matter jurisdiction) and jurisdiction ratione personae (personal jurisdiction). As an institution, the SADC Tribunal has achieved its intermediate goals of treaty interpretation and settlement of disputes. Beyond the intermediate goals set up by the SADC Tribunal's creators, this thesis showed the tribunal had achieved its ultimate goals of promoting human rights jurisprudence and developing SADC legal norms. Therefore, the SADC Tribunal has proven itself as an effective judicial institution that is ready to settle disputes between disputing parties. The prospects and potential of the SADC Tribunal should serve as a continuous incentive for reinstatement to its initial jurisdiction. These findings require some qualification, namely, as shown later in this research, that this does not mean that the SADC Tribunal decisions had significant impact at the domestic level. Rather, the evidence from this study indicates that the tribunal decisions had only marginal impact at the domestic level. This suggests that more effort must be made to mobilise civil society — including lawyers, human rights activists and domestic judges — to support the work of the SADC Tribunal. The evidence from this study intimates that it is through the efforts of such actors that tribunal judgments can have transformative impact in domestic courts.