NANFeatures/Vol.11/No.51/2017 (March 27)
Domesticating the Abidjan Declaration on statelessness
A News Analysis by Lizzy Okoji, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is championing the Global Action Plan to end statelessness in the world within 10 years.
According to the United Nations, statelessness is a phenomenon whereby a person does not belong to any nationality.
The grave consequence of such situation is that such an individual lacks the privilege of enjoying basic fundamental human rights.
A survey by the UNHCR shows that statelessness is an immense problem that affects about 10 million people worldwide, including 750,000 people in West Africa.
According to the survey, the causes of statelessness include gaps in nationality laws and administrative practices, failure to register a child at birth, decolonisation process, historical and contemporary migration, among others.
As part of the activities to mark the 60th anniversary of the 1954 convention relating to the status of stateless persons, the UN, on Nov. 4, 2014, launched a10-year global campaign to end statelessness by 2024in a bid to bridge these gaps.
The campaign includes a 10-point action plan that states can support with specific action points through national efforts.
To ensure the success of the global campaign, the UNHCR and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) organised a regional conference to brainstorm and evolve strategies towards addressing statelessness in West Africa.
The conference was held on Feb. 25, 2015, in Abidjan, Cote D’Ivoire, with the theme “Partnership to resolve Statelessness’’.
At the end of the conference, the Abidjan Declaration was signed and has been ratified by 15 countries in the sub-region.
By signing the declaration, member-states committed themselves to domesticating and implementing the document in line with their individual national plans to combat statelessness at the country level.
The Abidjan Declaration underscores the need for measures to prevent statelessness in West Africa, advising countries to reform their nationality laws where necessary, as appropriate safeguard against statelessness and accede as soon as possible, to the 1961 convention on the reduction of statelessness.
The declaration highlighted strategies and partnership of member-states as an important tool in actualising the goal of the global campaign.
It recommended regular meetings under the auspices of ECOWAS and UNHCR to assess the progress in the implementation of the declaration.
Nigeria is one of the countries that had ratified the declaration with commitments to tackle the root causes of statelessness in the country.
However, two years down the line, the Abidjan Declaration has yet to be domesticated and implemented in Nigeria, raising concern among concerned citizens that the document might suffer the same fate as many other international agreements.
In order to put the issue of statelessness on the front burner in Nigeria, UNHCR and ECOWAS have, therefore, set aside March 28 to commemorate the second anniversary of the Abidjan Declaration.
The event is expected to bring together stakeholders to discuss achievements so far recorded and share ideas on the way forward to ending statelessness in Nigeria.
Three focal organisations — UNHCR, ECOWAS and the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons (NCFRMI) and Civil Society Organisations — have been doing a lot to end the scourge and protect persons at risk in Nigeria.
Mr Hollo Roger, UNHCR Nigeria’s Senior Liaison Officer with ECOWAS, said part of the UN agency’s commitment to ending statelessness in Nigeria was taking the necessary steps to identify those at risk of statelessness.
“In 2016, UNHCR supported the West African Civil Society Forum on mapping of stateless persons and persons at risk of statelessness in the North-East of Nigeria.
“The findings reveal that persons at risk to include almajiris, abandoned and unaccompanied children as a result of displacement, population affected by transfer of territory who have yet to be resettled, reintegrated (as in the case of Bakassi Peninsula) and some categories of migrants and pastoralists.
“Progress has been made in UNHCR’s advocacy which led to the drafting of a national action plan to eradicate statelessness in Nigeria,’’ he said.
He further said that the draft national plan had been presented to the Ministry of Interior and for approval.
He said that the signing of the Tripartite Agreement between the Federal Government and the Republic of Cameroon on March 2, for the voluntary repatriation of Nigerian Refugees would also serve as a means of identifying and properly reducing potential risk of statelessness.
According to him, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is currently supporting the National Population Commission to issue birth certificates to children under five years in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe.
This, he said, was a very important step to establishing identity for the children and acquiring them a nationality.
Similarly, the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons (NCFRMI) said that it would continue to protect stateless persons in the country and tackle situations that could lead to statelessness.
The Federal Commissioner of the NCFRMI, Hajia Sadia Umar-Farouk, said that the commission had embarked on a sensitisation campaign to create awareness on statelessness as many people were stateless and unaware of the phenomenon.
She explained that through the Commission’s Refugees Status Determination, it has identified those at risk, especially in the eastern part of Nigeria.
This, she said, had further spurred the commission and stakeholders to push for the domestication of relevant conventions concerning displacement and statelessness.
“Since Nigeria ratified the Abidjan Declaration in 2014, there has been tremendous progress in the push for its domestication and we have continued to push for it alongside the National Policy on IDPs to help reduce the risk of statelessness.
“We have recently completed a review on the National Policy on Internally Displaced Persons and have redoubled efforts to see that it is passed into law urgently.
“The recent bilateral agreement between Nigeria and Cameroon would be able to protect refugees who have fled to Cameroon and prevent them from the risk of statelessness,’’ Umar-Farouk said.
In the same vein, Rep. Sani Zoro, the Chairman, House Committee on Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons, pledged the commitment of legislators to prioritise the process of domesticating the Abidjan Declaration.
Zoro said it was imperative to take such action considering the possibility of a looming stateless situation in the country arising from other causes including returnees and the nationals of other countries residing in Nigeria without proper documentation.
He said that even though a lot of achievements, actions and commitments had been recorded in the past two years by the Federal Government, UNHCR, the Civil Society Organisations and relevant stakeholders, more efforts were needed to completely combat statelessness.
He said that the most important commitment was the signing of the National Draft Action Plan and the speedy domestication of the Abidjan Declaration.
Observers note that since the adoption of the Abidjan Declaration, more than 45,000 people declared stateless or at risk of statelessness have received identity in West Africa.
Out of these, 34,000 birth certificates were issued in the Republic of Benin Republic, Cote d’Ivoire and Mali, while 10,550 nationality certificates were issued in Cote d’Ivoire.
Observers, therefore, insist that there is the need for governments at all levels and individuals to show commitments in line with UNHCR’s global target of eradicating statelessness by 2024.(NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the writer as well as News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)