Preface to the third edition
This is the third edition of this book, originally published in 2009 and written
while I was an employee of Open Society Foundations (OSF). The second
edition of 2010 included updates on several countries and some minor
corrections. This third edition is a comprehensive revision of the original text,
updated to reflect developments at national and continental levels, to clarify
some interpretations based on my increased understanding of the issues,
and to present completely revised and improved tables based on comparative
analysis of the nationality laws of 54 countries in Africa, as well as additional
tables dealing with new aspects of the law. The appendix contains the updated
list of laws in force as of 2015 used to compile this study.
Among the countries that have adopted revisions to their nationality laws
of greater or lesser significance since 2009/10 are Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, Libya,
Mali, Mauritania, Namibia, Niger, Senegal, Seychelles, South Africa, Sudan,
Tunisia and Zimbabwe. Perhaps the most significant other developments
with impacts on nationality law and the right to a nationality are the secession
of South Sudan from Sudan, and the impact of South Sudan’s new nationality
on both countries, and the transfer of sovereignty of the Bakassi peninsula
from Nigeria to Cameroon.
There have also been major developments in standard-setting at the
African and international levels. The African Commission on Human and
Peoples’ Rights adopted two resolutions and a study on the right to nationality
in Africa, leading up to the adoption in July 2015 of a draft Protocol to the
African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Specific Aspects of
the Right to a Nationality and the Eradication of Statelessness in Africa. The
African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child handed
down an important decision on the nationality of children of Nubian origin in
Kenya in 2011, which informed a General Comment on Article 6 of the African
Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (name, birth registration and a
nationality) adopted by the Committee in 2014. The UN High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR) has also adopted a number of guidelines and other
documents on statelessness and in 2014 launched a major campaign to end
statelessness within 10 years. In Africa, UNHCR’s regional office in Dakar
has collaborated with the Economic Community of West African States
(ECOWAS), leading to the adoption in 2015 of a regional declaration on the
urgency of addressing statelessness.
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