CASE NOTE
ANUDO OCHIENG ANUDO V TANZANIA (JUDGMENT)
(AFRICAN COURT ON HUMAN AND PEOPLES’
RIGHTS, APP NO 012/2015, 22 MARCH 2018)
BRONWEN MANBY *
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
Introduction........................................................................................................... 170
Facts ...................................................................................................................... 171
Issues..................................................................................................................... 172
Holding ................................................................................................................. 172
A Admissibility ............................................................................................ 172
B Merits........................................................................................................ 173
Reasoning or Analysis .......................................................................................... 173
Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 174
I
INTRODUCTION
Anudo Ochieng Anudo v Tanzania (‘Anudo case’) 1 is the first case decided by the
African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights (‘African Court’) that considers the
right to a nationality. The judgment complements existing jurisprudence from the
African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (‘African Commission’) and
the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child. 2 The
African Court ruled that Tanzania had arbitrarily deprived the applicant of his
nationality and then arbitrarily expelled him from the country.
Perhaps the most important aspect of the judgment was the holding that in the
context where a person has previously been issued documents recognising
nationality, the burden of proof falls on the state to prove that the applicant was
not a national. 3 A person must have the opportunity to make his or her case before
an independent body, and decisions relating to nationality cannot be kept at the
administrative level.
*
1
2
3
Bronwen Manby is a senior policy and teaching fellow at the London School of Economics
and Political Science, and an independent consultant. She previously worked for the Open
Society Foundations and Human Rights Watch. She has written extensively on statelessness
and the right to a nationality in Africa, and her book Citizenship in Africa: The Law of
Belonging was published by Hart Publishing in November 2018.
(Judgment) (African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, App No 012/2015, 22 March
2018) (‘Anudo case’).
See Bronwen Manby, Citizenship in Africa: The Law of Belonging (Hart 2018) (‘Citizenship
in Africa’); Bronwen Manby, Citizenship Law in Africa: A Comparative Study (Open Society
Foundations, 3rd ed, 2016).
Anudo case (n 1) 18 [80].