admissibility and the new facts; the Criminal Procedure Code of Djibouti; and a picture
of aircraft alleged to have been used to transfer the Complainant from Tanzania.
120. The submissions advanced by both parties during the oral hearing will be
canvassed in the Commission analysis.
The Commission’s Analysis on Admissibility
121. The present Communication is submitted under Article 55 of the Charter
which allows the Commission to consider Communications other than those
submitted by State Parties.
122. The admissibility of such Communications is governed by Article 56 of the
Charter. Article 56 of the African Charter provides for seven conditions to be
satisfied for a Communication to be admitted for consideration on the merits.
123. The Commission’s jurisprudence is to the effect that the seven conditions
under Article 56 of the Charter are cumulative and must each be adequately fulfilled
for a Communication to be declared admissible. Consequently, if upon the
Commission’s assessment any one of the conditions is not satisfied, the
Communication will be declared inadmissible entirely or to the extent of nonconformity as the case may be.4
124. Further, whereas the Complainant is required to address each condition with
arguments and supporting evidence, the exchange of written arguments and
supporting evidence by parties through the Secretariat serves the purpose of
identifying and defining the real issues that are in contention between the parties,
and which need to be focussed on regarding the admissibility of the
Communication. This however does not mean that where an issue does not arise on
any given condition the Commission will ipso facto consider such condition as
satisfied. On the contrary, the requirement that each condition must be adequately
fulfilled entails that the Commission will examine the Communication’s compliance
with each condition based on the material presented.
Communication 304/05 – FIDH and others v Senegal (2006) ACHPR para 38; Communication 338/07 Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) v Nigeria (2010) ACHPR para 43; and
Communication 284/03 - Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights & Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe v
Zimbabwe (2009) ACHPR para 81.
4
23