Joint Press Statement | African Youth Take Climate Justice Fight To The African Court, Declaring Climate Inaction A Present Human Rights Violation

Date: 23/07/2026


In a historic milestone for regional environmental litigation, Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR) and Young Voices for Climate Justice (YV4CJ) have officially filed their joint amicus curiae (friend of the court) written submissions before the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights. 

 

The intervention takes place within the context of the Pan-African Lawyers Union’s (PALU) request for a landmark Advisory Opinion regarding the specific legal obligations of African States to address the worsening climate crisis.

Centering the Lived Realities of African Youth 

While climate change is frequently debated through abstract economic figures and global emissions statistics, this joint brief intentionally moves the dialogue into the realm of human suffering and child rights. Admitted under the Court’s rules, LHR and YV4CJ have placed a series of poignant, unfiltered “Love Letters to the Court” directly onto the desks of the Honourable Justices. These written testimonies from children and youth aged 10 to 25 detail the devastating, daily impacts of environmental degradation across South Africa. 

The front-line submissions highlight a harsh reality – children and youth contribute the least to greenhouse gas emissions, yet they carry the heaviest, long-lasting consequences of climate inaction. 

The annexed testimonies outline clear systemic violations: 

  •  Weather Extremes & Health: Youth from Durban detail the lingering physical and psychological trauma of the catastrophic April 2022 floods, which left communities displaced and exposed to stagnant water and respiratory illnesses. 
  • Extractive Operations: Children from mining-impacted areas like Fleurhof and Tshepisong West in Johannesburg describe inhaling toxic mine dust on a daily basis, directly linking underground corporate mining activities to rising childhood asthma, Tuberculosis (TB), and Silicosis. 
  •  The Right to Education and Health: Extreme heatwaves have made township classrooms unbearable, directly infringing on the right to education by destroying learners’ ability to concentrate. University students further outline how rising temperatures cause painful medical flare-ups of chronic skin conditions like eczema 

A Rigorous Legal Call for Corporate Oversight and State Liability 

LHR and YV4CJ argue that the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the African Children’s Charter place clear, positive legal duties on States. Backed by international counsel, the joint brief demands that the African Court clarify regional standards on three non-negotiable fronts: 

  1. Intergenerational Equity: States must act with immediate foresight and precaution to protect the environment for present and future generations, rather than shifting environmental burdens onto younger cohorts. 
  2. Corporate Regulation: Grounded in pioneering regional jurisprudence (SERAC v Nigeria), States violate their human rights obligations when they fail to strictly oversee, regulate, and penalise private multinational corporations and extractive industries that destroy local ecosystems. 
  3. Pathways to Accountability and Reparations: The Court must encourage novel remediessuch as mandatory intergenerational committeesto give youth active oversight in climate adaptation policies, alongside accessible, child-sensitive judicial mechanisms for loss and damage. 

“This matter represents LHR’s first formal intervention before the African Court, and it marks a turning point in how we approach strategic environmental litigation, we are ensuring that the legal interpretation of State obligations is completely inseparable from the actual voices of the children who are forced to live with the consequences of state and corporate negligence.” – Lawyers for human Rights 

“My interest in climate change grew bigger when my elderly neighbour got diagnosed with TB and Silicosis. Her lung diseases were caused by the toxic dust the coal mine releases… The mine in my community causes the air to be unclean and not breathable. Breathing in unclean air is not good for our lungs and can lead to lung failure… nobody deserves to experience the bad things that mines produce.” – Bongeka, a climate justice youth from Fleurhof, shares the devastating health impacts of corporate mining in her letter: 

“We are not only inheriting the future, but we are also already living with the consequences of decisions made today. Companies that pollute our air, contaminate our water, or destroy our environment must be held responsible. They should not be allowed to prioritise profit over people’s lives.”– Paul Junior Malinda, a youth from Tshepisong West and member of YV4CJ, states in his letter to the Court. 

The joint applicants respectfully urge the African Court to uphold the constitutional and regional rights of youth, establishing a robust precedent that forces African governments to protect both their children and the planet. 

 ENDS 

For media enquiries, interview requests, please contact: Mpho@lhr.org.za  

Thank you for joining
Thank you for joining the LHR Newsletter, we will be in touch soon