Pan-African Parliament Begins Process for Model Law on Family Protection in Africa

MIDRAND, South Africa — The Pan-African Parliament has initiated a continental dialogue on the possible development of a Model Law on the Protection of the Family Unit, seeking to strengthen legal safeguards for families while promoting greater harmonization of laws across African Union Member States.

The Parliamentary Stakeholder Dialogue was organized by the Committee on Gender, Family, Youth and Persons with Disabilities on the margins of the ongoing Sitting of Permanent Committees.

The meeting brought together Members of the Pan-African Parliament, representatives of the African Union Commission and United Nations, civil society organizations, legal practitioners, academics and development partners.

Participants examined existing family-related laws and policies, identified weaknesses in their implementation and considered how a continental Model Law could guide Member States in strengthening family welfare, social protection, equality and access to justice.

The initiative represents the first stage of a wider consultation process that is expected to include comparative legal research, regional consultations and further engagement with governments, parliaments, civil society and affected communities.

Building a Common African Framework

Opening the dialogue, Chairperson of the Committee on Gender, Family, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, Hon. Mariam Dao Gabala, described the meeting as the beginning of a shared continental journey towards stronger parliamentary leadership on family-related issues.

She said the Committee has a central responsibility to promote evidence-based legislative development and effective parliamentary oversight in advancing African Union priorities relating to gender equality, family welfare, youth development and the rights of persons with disabilities.

Hon. Gabala explained that the proposed Model Law would seek to identify and address gaps in existing national frameworks while drawing on the perspectives of stakeholders from Africa’s different legal, constitutional and cultural traditions.

African families, she observed, are confronting increasingly complex pressures arising from poverty, violence, harmful practices, armed conflict, displacement, climate-related emergencies and changing social and demographic structures.

These challenges require coordinated legislative and policy responses that protect individuals and strengthen the capacity of families to provide care, security and social support.

Families Confront Rapid Social and Economic Change

Delivering a virtual presentation, Dr. Olubusayo Akinola, Head of the Social Welfare, Drug Control and Crime Prevention Division in the African Union Commission’s Department of Health, Humanitarian Affairs and Social Development, examined the changing conditions affecting African families.

She said rapid urbanization, internal and international migration, conflict, climate change and evolving household structures are creating new vulnerabilities that existing social and legal systems are not always equipped to address.

Although several Member States have incorporated family-centred measures into national development plans and expanded social-protection and community-care programmes, implementation remains uneven.

The African Union has long recognized the family as an important focus of continental social policy. In 2004, the AU Executive Council adopted a decision on the Plan of Action on the Family in Africa, establishing a framework for Member States to strengthen family welfare and integrate family concerns into development planning.

The AU’s wider social-development framework also includes the protection of vulnerable groups, the family, gender equality, children, older persons and persons with disabilities as interconnected areas of public policy.

Dr. Akinola called for accelerated implementation of the Plan of Action through family- and age-responsive policies, reliable data and monitoring systems, sustainable financing and stronger institutional partnerships.

She also urged Member States to strengthen laws protecting families and vulnerable persons, establish effective implementation and accountability mechanisms and intensify action against harmful practices, substance abuse and other threats to family welfare.

Social Protection Must Respond to Different Generations

The dialogue emphasized that family protection cannot be achieved through family law alone.

It must also involve accessible education and healthcare, income security, child protection, support for older persons and persons with disabilities, prevention of violence and assistance for households affected by unemployment, displacement and emergencies.

Inclusive social-protection systems can help families manage risks across different stages of life and reduce the disproportionate burden of unpaid care frequently carried by women and girls.

The African Union defines social protection broadly as measures intended to protect people from life-cycle risks and crises that can undermine their welfare and livelihoods.

Dr. Akinola therefore encouraged Member States to pursue family-centred development policies founded on intergenerational solidarity and the principle that no person should be left behind because of age, gender, disability or economic circumstances.

Such an approach supports Agenda 2063, the African Union’s long-term framework for inclusive and sustainable development, democratic governance, peace and shared prosperity.

Parliamentarians Identify Gaps Between Policy and Practice

Following the presentation, Members of the Committee reflected on the practical implementation of African Union legal and policy instruments at the national level.

They observed that the existence of continental frameworks does not automatically produce protection unless Member States incorporate them into domestic laws, allocate sufficient resources and establish credible enforcement systems.

Members highlighted the need to:

·       improve the domestication and implementation of African Union instruments;

·       address harmful practices and discriminatory provisions;

·       close legislative and institutional gaps;

·       expand family-centred social-protection initiatives; and

·       strengthen cooperation among parliaments, AU institutions and development partners.

The discussions underscored the important role of national parliaments in reviewing legislation, approving budgets, monitoring executive action and ensuring that family-related programmes reach their intended beneficiaries.

The proposed Model Law could provide parliamentarians with a common reference framework while allowing individual Member States to adapt its provisions to their legal and constitutional systems.

Model Laws Promote Harmonization Without Replacing National Legislation

Model laws developed by the Pan-African Parliament do not automatically become binding legislation within Member States.

Rather, they operate as persuasive continental frameworks that can assist governments and national parliaments in drafting or reforming domestic laws.

The Pan-African Parliament has previously developed Model Laws in areas including policing, disability, food and nutrition security, labour migration and gender equality and equity.

PAP describes these instruments as soft-law frameworks that encourage consistency while allowing countries to make appropriate modifications to suit national circumstances.

The development of a Model Law on Family Protection could therefore help establish common principles and minimum standards without attempting to impose a single, uniform family code on all African countries.

This distinction will be particularly important because family-related matters are governed by widely differing statutory, customary and religious legal systems across the continent.

Experts Call for Equality and Access to Justice

The dialogue also received contributions from Ms Deborah Nyokabi of Equality Now, Ms Hazel Goodine, Deputy Representative of UN Women South Africa, and Ms Sibongile Ndashe, Executive Director of the Initiative for Strategic Litigation in Africa.

The speakers examined the legal, policy and human rights dimensions of family protection and drew attention to gaps arising from the coexistence of statutory, customary and religious laws.

In many African jurisdictions, different legal systems apply simultaneously to marriage, divorce, inheritance, property, custody and guardianship.

This legal pluralism can reflect Africa’s cultural and religious diversity. However, conflicting rules and weak enforcement can also produce uncertainty, unequal treatment and barriers to justice, especially for women, children and people whose marriages or family relationships are not formally registered.

A 2024 Equality Now study assessing family laws in 20 African countries found continuing gaps between national laws and obligations under instruments including the Maputo Protocol and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

Equality Now has also reported that the interaction of civil, customary and religious laws can leave women and girls facing discrimination in areas such as inheritance, marital property, divorce, custody and the legal recognition of marriages.

The speakers consequently stressed that any Model Law should reinforce existing African Union legal and policy instruments, promote equality and non-discrimination, strengthen accountability and improve access to justice.

They also emphasised that the process should respect the diverse constitutional, legal and cultural contexts of African Union Member States.

Protecting the Family and Protecting Individual Rights

A central challenge for the proposed initiative will be to ensure that protection of the family is understood in a manner that safeguards the dignity and rights of every person within it.

A strong family-protection framework should support stable and caring households while also providing effective remedies against domestic violence, child marriage, abandonment, exploitation, discriminatory inheritance practices and other violations that may occur within family or community settings.

The principle of family protection must therefore complement, rather than weaken, existing continental obligations relating to women’s rights, children’s rights, disability inclusion and equality before the law.

Recent African family-law research has particularly highlighted the need to harmonise statutory, customary and religious systems with regional human rights standards so that women and girls receive equal protection regardless of the legal system under which their family relationships are recognised.

The stakeholder dialogue acknowledged that legal harmonization should not be confused with erasing Africa’s cultural diversity.

Instead, it should establish shared standards of dignity, equality, protection and accountability while allowing countries to determine how those principles are incorporated into their domestic legal systems.

Consultation Will Be Essential

The proposed Model Law remains at an early conceptual stage.

The Parliamentary Stakeholder Dialogue was intended to generate initial perspectives rather than settle the final content or scope of the initiative.

The outcomes are expected to guide comparative research into family-related laws across Member States and inform subsequent regional and continental consultations.

An inclusive process will be essential to its legitimacy.

Future consultations should involve not only public institutions and legal experts, but also women’s and children’s rights organizations, organizations of persons with disabilities, faith and traditional leaders, youth representatives, social workers, family-policy researchers and communities affected by discriminatory or ineffective laws.

The Pan-African Parliament has previously used regional consultation processes in developing its Model Laws, including consultations on the Model Law on Gender Equality and Equity before its adoption.

That experience could provide useful lessons for ensuring that the proposed family-protection framework is evidence-based, widely understood and capable of being implemented by national legislatures.

From Continental Dialogue to National Reform

The Parliamentary Stakeholder Dialogue marks an important step towards a more coordinated African approach to family policy and legislation.

However, the value of any eventual Model Law will depend on whether it produces meaningful national reforms.

Its provisions will need to be clear enough to guide legislative drafting, flexible enough to accommodate different constitutional arrangements and firmly grounded in existing African Union human rights and social-development instruments.

The process must also balance several legitimate objectives: supporting families as foundations of society, protecting individuals from discrimination and violence, respecting cultural diversity and ensuring that national laws meet continental standards.

If developed through broad consultation and supported by strong parliamentary advocacy, the proposed Model Law could help Member States close legislative gaps, strengthen social protection and provide more consistent safeguards for families and vulnerable persons.

For the Pan-African Parliament, the initiative also offers an opportunity to demonstrate the practical contribution that continental parliamentary cooperation can make to legal harmonisation and citizen-centred development.

The challenge now is to convert the initial dialogue into rigorous research, inclusive consultation and a credible African-led framework capable of improving the lives of families across the continent.