On the occasion of the celebrations marking African Human Rights Day, the Honourable Justice Sanji Mmasenon Monageng, the chairperson of the African Commission on Human and people' Rights, has hailed the level of freedom being experienced by Africans, describing it as unprecedented.

According to a press release from the African Commission on Human and People's Rights, the commemoration of the Africa Human Rights Day marks the adoption of the historic document of the African Charter on Human and People's Rights, an instrument that reaffirmed "adhearance to the principles of human and people's right and freedoms," and aimed to address the multitude of human rights problems that are affecting the lives of millions of men, women and children in the region, including the challenges of conflicts, diseases - especially HIV/AIDS, poverty and discrimination.

The release states that ,this observance provide a unique opportunity to engage our peoples in the activities of the ACHPR and to provide an opportunity to promote the actual exercise and enjoyment of human and people's rights and basic freedoms.  It therefore called on states parties to the African Charter, national human rights institutions, non-governmental organisations, all organisations working in various domains of human rights and the public, to celebrate this day in order to promote the effective realisation of fundamental liberties in Africa.

The release went on: "In the last 20 years, human rights and freedom have seen an unprecedented expansion around Africa. At no point in history have people been freer."

The release seeks to remind people of the problems posed by food scarcity which it says affects hundreds of thousands of people around the continent; and the recent xenophobic attacks on innocent foreign citizens in South Africa, some of whom, unfortunately, lost their lives.

It concludes that governments that have ratified the African Charter do realise that neither the AU nor the ACHPR offers any "quick fix" to human rights problems. "By the same token, they acknowledge that the AU is an essential body through which multilateral processes can be brought to bear to contribute to the challenges and solutions facing Africa.

Africa Human Rights Day offers an opportunity to governments to reflect on the commitments they have made to their own people', and to groups and individuals, it provides an opportunity to acquaint themselves with the mandate and programmes of the ACHPR: to address the challenges we face together, as Africa takes its rightful place in the communities of nations as a region dedicated to the observance of human rights, the release concludes.