a) The Court must be properly constituted
b) The subject matter of the suit must be within the jurisdiction of the Court
and
c) The suit must have been initiated by due process.
In this regard, jurisdiction is inferred from the facts presented by an Applicant
(Plaintiff) and not from the defense. A careful examination of the facts relied
upon in this Application and the reliefs being sought by the Applicant show that
the crux of his allegation is that he was arrested and detained without any lawful
justification and in violation of his rights as guaranteed by Articles 3, 6, 12, 14 of
the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and other International
Human Rights Instruments to which the Defendant is a party.
In addition, the Applicant further contends that the unlawfulness of his arrest is
reinforced by the Statement purportedly made by the President of the
Defendant that the Applicant will never be released.
It must be noted that the Court at this stage is not determining
whether these allegations are true or not but whether it has power to inquire
into the merits of the case. The jurisdiction of this Court over human rights and
the accompanying jurisprudence is contained in Article 9(4) of the
Supplementary Protocol 2005 which provides that:
“The Court has jurisdiction to determine cases of violation of human rights that
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