Nigeria Must Protest Xenophobia Without Boycotting the Pan-African Parliament

Nigeria should exempt its PAP delegation from the South Africa travel boycott because the Parliament is an AU organ funded by Member States, including Nigeria.

Nigeria’s National Assembly is right to express outrage over the recurring xenophobic and Afrophobic attacks against Nigerians and other African nationals in South Africa. It is also entitled to demand effective protection, transparent investigations and the prosecution of those responsible for killings, intimidation and destruction of property.

However, the leadership of the National Assembly should urgently reconsider the application of its suspension of official visits to South Africa to Nigeria’s five-member delegation to the Pan-African Parliament.

The Pan-African Parliament is not a department, agency or legislative institution of the South African Government. It is an organ of the African Union, established to represent the peoples of Africa and promote their participation in the continent’s integration and development.

Its location in Midrand does not transform it into an institution of the host country. South Africa provides the seat; it does not own the Parliament.

Consequently, preventing Nigeria’s delegation from attending PAP plenary sittings, committee meetings and other statutory activities risks directing a legitimate protest against South Africa towards an African Union institution in which Nigeria is both a member and major stakeholder.

A justified protest with an unintended target

The National Assembly’s circular suspends all official visits to South Africa by its lawmakers, committees, officials and staff. On a literal application, the restriction prevents members of Nigeria’s PAP delegation from travelling to Midrand unless they first obtain the express approval of the National Assembly leadership.

Yet participation in a sitting of the Pan-African Parliament is not engagement with the Parliament of South Africa. It is the discharge of Nigeria’s treaty obligations within an organ of the African Union.

The distinction is fundamental.

The African Union identifies the PAP as one of its organs, established as a platform through which Africans can participate in discussions and decision-making on the continent’s challenges. Article 17 of the Constitutive Act establishes the Pan-African Parliament to ensure “the full participation of African peoples in the development and economic integration of the continent.” The AU also describes it as its continental parliamentary organ.

A boycott of South African governmental or parliamentary activities is a bilateral measure. A boycott that prevents Nigerian representatives from participating in the PAP is, in practical effect, a withdrawal from the activities of a continental institution.

That consequence may not have been intended, but it cannot be ignored.

The decision could be misconstrued as an adverse action against the AU

Nigeria has not withdrawn from the African Union. It has not suspended its obligations under the PAP Protocol, nor has it announced any dispute with the Pan-African Parliament.

Nevertheless, the absence of Nigeria’s delegation from PAP sittings could be interpreted within the AU system as an adverse decision against the Union or as voluntary disengagement from one of its organs.

This would send the wrong message.

Nigeria has historically been one of the strongest advocates of African unity, decolonization and continental cooperation. It played a major role in the liberation of Southern Africa and has consistently supported the institutions of the Organization of African Unity and its successor, the African Union.

The National Assembly should not allow a justified protest against the failure of South African authorities to protect African migrants to be interpreted as a retreat from Pan-Africanism.

Indeed, the PAP is one of the institutions through which Nigeria can internationalize the issue of Afrophobic violence. Nigerian parliamentarians should be present in Midrand to demand action, build coalitions with other national delegations, initiate committee investigations and place the treatment of African migrants firmly on the continental parliamentary agenda.

Withdrawing from that arena weakens Nigeria’s ability to influence the very debate it wants Africa to confront.

Why boycott an institution Nigeria helps to finance?

The financial implications are equally important.

The Pan-African Parliament is funded through the African Union budget. That budget is financed substantially by assessed contributions from AU Member States, including Nigeria. Member States have committed themselves to funding the Union’s operational budget and increasing African ownership of its programmes. The AU has repeatedly stressed that sustainable financing is essential to the independence and effectiveness of its institutions.

Nigeria therefore contributes financially to the institutional machinery through which the PAP operates. Its contributions help support the Parliament’s sessions, administration, interpretation services, committees and other programmes.

It would be difficult to justify a situation in which Nigeria continues to finance the African Union but voluntarily denies itself representation in one of the institutions supported by that financing.

The practical question is unavoidable: why should Nigeria boycott an activity for which it helps to pay, particularly when the activity is organized by the AU rather than the South African Government?

Nigeria’s financial contribution gives it an interest in ensuring that the PAP functions effectively and that its voice is heard in the institution. Non-participation does not financially punish South Africa. It merely deprives Nigeria of the benefit of its membership and contributions.

The empty seats of Nigerian parliamentarians would not belong to South Africa. They would be Nigeria’s empty seats in an African Union organ.

PAP parliamentarians enjoy treaty-based privileges and immunities

The legal protections accorded to members of the Pan-African Parliament provide another compelling reason for distinguishing PAP activities from ordinary visits to South Africa.

Article 8(1) of the Protocol to the Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community Relating to the Pan-African Parliament provides:

“The Pan-African Parliamentarians, while exercising their functions, shall enjoy in the territory of each Member State the immunities and privileges extended to representatives of Member States under the General Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the OAU and the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.”

Article 9(1) further provides:

“The Pan-African Parliamentarians shall enjoy parliamentary immunity in each Member State. Accordingly, a member of the Pan-African Parliament shall not be liable to civil or criminal proceedings, arrest, imprisonment or damages for what is said or done by him or her within or outside the Pan-African Parliament in his or her capacity as a member of Parliament in the discharge of his or her duties.”

These protections are not mere courtesies extended at the discretion of the South African Government. They arise from a continental treaty binding upon the relevant Member States.

They recognize that Pan-African parliamentarians must be able to travel, speak, deliberate and vote independently without intimidation, arrest or legal retaliation for the proper discharge of their parliamentary responsibilities.

The PAP headquarters in Midrand also operates within the framework governing the seat and functioning of an African Union institution in a host country. It should therefore be treated as an AU institutional precinct enjoying the protections and facilities necessary for the Parliament to perform its functions.

Strictly speaking, however, it is preferable to describe the Midrand complex as the protected premises of an AU organ rather than simply calling it a “diplomatic vicinity.” The strongest legal argument rests on the PAP Protocol, the applicable privileges and immunities regime, and South Africa’s obligations as host not merely on the physical character of the premises.

Similarly, parliamentary immunity is functional rather than an absolute guarantee against every possible danger. It protects members in the discharge of their duties and shields them from specified legal processes; it cannot by itself prevent private acts of violence outside the PAP premises.

Nevertheless, Nigeria’s PAP delegation occupies a substantially different legal and institutional position from an ordinary National Assembly delegation visiting South Africa for a bilateral conference. PAP members travel to exercise treaty-based functions in an AU organ and are entitled to corresponding privileges, immunities and host-country protection.

Nigeria should occupy the PAP, not vacate it

The appropriate response to Afrophobic violence is not for Nigeria to surrender its platform within Africa’s continental Parliament.

Nigeria’s delegation should attend the PAP and use every available parliamentary mechanism to press the issue. Its members can demand debates, introduce motions, seek resolutions and call for investigations by the relevant permanent committees.

They can also urge the PAP to undertake a fact-finding mission, engage affected migrant communities and invite the South African authorities to provide evidence of arrests, prosecutions and measures taken to prevent further attacks.

Nigeria could seek a PAP resolution calling for:

1. The immediate implementation of an early-warning mechanism between Nigeria and South Africa;
2. Independent investigations into reported killings and alleged abuses involving security personnel;
3. Regular publication of arrests, prosecutions and convictions arising from attacks on foreign nationals;
4. Protection for documented migrants, refugees, asylum seekers and lawful foreign-owned businesses;
5. Compensation or appropriate remedies for victims whose property has been destroyed;
6. Continental guidelines for preventing xenophobia and Afrophobia across AU Member States; and
7. Periodic reporting to the PAP by the African Union Commission and affected Member States.

None of these objectives can be advanced effectively from an empty seat.

Non-participation could weaken Nigeria’s continental influence

Nigeria has five representatives in the Pan-African Parliament. Their participation extends beyond plenary debates to committee deliberations, regional caucuses, election observation, policy development and engagement with other African legislatures.

If the delegation remains absent, Nigeria may lose opportunities to shape recommendations and resolutions on peace and security, migration, human rights, democracy, trade, climate change and the implementation of Agenda 2063.

Other delegations will continue to deliberate and take positions. Reports will be adopted and decisions will be made. Nigeria’s absence will not stop the PAP; it will simply remove Nigeria’s voice from the process.

The consequences may become more serious if the suspension continues for an extended period. Repeated absence could affect committee work, institutional relationships and Nigeria’s ability to build support for its candidates and policy priorities.

At a time when Nigeria is seeking stronger African cooperation on the protection of its citizens, diminishing its presence within the continental Parliament would be strategically counterproductive.

A targeted exemption would preserve both protest and participation

The National Assembly does not need to abandon its protest against South Africa. It can maintain the suspension of bilateral legislative visits and activities hosted by the South African Parliament while creating a clear exemption for statutory meetings of the Pan-African Parliament.

That distinction would be principled and legally defensible.

The leadership could issue a clarification stating that:

1. The suspension applies to bilateral engagements with South African legislative institutions;
2. It does not constitute a boycott of the African Union or any of its organs;
3. Nigeria’s delegation may continue to attend duly convened PAP plenary sittings, committee meetings and other statutory activities;
4. The PAP and South African authorities must provide appropriate security assurances for the delegation; and
5. Participation in the PAP should be used to advance continental action against xenophobia and Afrophobia.

Alternatively, the leadership could grant standing approval to the delegation for official PAP activities rather than requiring separate permission for each meeting.

This approach would preserve the force of the National Assembly’s protest without imposing unintended costs on Nigeria or weakening its position within the AU.

The PAP itself must act

Exempting Nigeria’s delegation from the suspension should not amount to business as usual.

The Pan-African Parliament must recognize that Nigeria’s concerns strike at the heart of its mandate. An African Parliament cannot credibly promote free movement, continental integration and African solidarity while remaining indifferent to organized hostility against Africans in its host country.

The PAP leadership should engage the National Assembly of Nigeria, the Parliament of South Africa, the South African Government and the African Union Commission.

It should seek verifiable commitments on protection, investigation and prosecution. It should also consider convening a dedicated debate on xenophobia and Afrophobia and developing a continental framework through which national parliaments can hold governments accountable for attacks against African migrants.

South Africa, as host of the PAP, bears a special responsibility to ensure that members of the continental Parliament can enter, remain in and leave the country safely while performing their functions.

Nigeria must not silence itself

The National Assembly’s anger is understandable. The recurring attacks on Nigerians and other Africans demand more than diplomatic assurances and repeated condemnations.

But the answer is not for Nigeria to silence itself within the Pan-African Parliament.

The PAP belongs to Nigeria as much as it belongs to South Africa and every other AU Member State. Nigeria contributes to its funding, designates parliamentarians to represent its people and has a direct interest in its effectiveness.

The National Assembly should therefore reconsider the application of its travel suspension to PAP activities and issue an explicit exemption for Nigeria’s delegation.

Nigeria should boycott bilateral engagements where necessary to demonstrate its displeasure. It should not boycott its own seat at the continental table.

The strongest response to Afrophobia is not withdrawal from Pan-African institutions. It is to occupy those institutions, demand accountability and use them to ensure that no African is treated as a foreigner to be hunted, intimidated or expelled anywhere on the continent.