Guaranteeing Socio-Economic Rights in the Constitution: A Case for Sierra Leone

Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai

Society for Democratic Initiatives

Introduction

Sierra Leone is a small country with a population of 7 million people situated on the West African coast. The country is rich in natural resources, but has always lingered at the bottom of the United Nation’s development league tables and is consistently one of the lowest ranked in the United Nations Development Program’s Human Development Report. In 1991, the country reformed its Constitution. In the same year, a decade of brutal civil war began, from which Sierra Leone has recently emerged. An outbreak of Ebola virus that ravaged the health care system, and the effect of the global pandemic of COVID-19, have also left the country quite shaken. The civil war, Ebola and COVID-19 have had many disastrous effects on the social and economic fabric of the nation. At the height of the armed conflict, the country’s infrastructure was almost completely destroyed and many citizens were subjected to atrocious violations of their human rights.

In 1996, Sierra Leone became a signatory of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). A multilateral treaty adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, this document commits its states parities parties to work toward the granting of economic, social and cultural rights to individuals, particularly through legislation. The rights specified in the document include the rights to work under “just and favorable conditions”, to social security, to family life (including the protection of children), an adequate standard of living, health, education, and participation in cultural life. Many of these rights are spoken of in general terms, while others are provided with more specificity.

Article Two of the Covenant imposes a duty on all parties to “take steps... to the maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in the present Covenant by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of legislative measures”.  This article recognizes that each state party faces its own challenges to guaranteeing the socio-economic rights of its citizens and that all states parties are limited by the resources they have. 

The Sierra Leone Constitution

In 1991, Sierra Leone ratified a new Constitution. This Constitution amended and repealed the Constitution of 1978. Unfortunately, while the Constitution made progressive changes in various areas, it still does not meet the obligations Sierra Leone has under the ICESCR. 

The second chapter of the Constitution addresses the rights of citizens, including their socio-economic rights. Section 7 discusses the “Economic Objectives” of the Constitution, while s 8 focuses on its “Social Objectives”. These two sections provide the right to “engage in any economic activity” in work conditions that are “just, fair, and humane”, and provide for non-discriminatory pay. This chapter also imposes a duty on the government to create policies that provide its citizens the opportunity for “securing adequate means of livelihood”. The government also has the duty to work toward agriculture policies that ensure “self-sufficiency in food production”, and health rights are provided by requiring the government to ensure “there are adequate medical and health facilities for all persons, having due regard to the resources of the State”. In terms of education, the Constitution provides that the government will ensure that “every citizen is given the opportunity to be educated to the best of his ability” and that the government “shall strive to eradicate illiteracy” (s 9). 

However, the rights listed in ss 7 and 8 are inadequate. In addition to the design issues, it will be extremely important how they are applied in practice: in courts, in government policies and programs, and in legislative undertakings. Though the Constitution provides for protection of the right to move to any location one wants, for example, there is no fundamental right to housing mentioned in the Constitution. The briefly-mentioned agricultural policy does not guarantee a citizens’ right to food. Furthermore, the rights outlined in these sections are not guaranteed (woefully lacking is any formulation similar to “every citizen is guaranteed the right to . . .” as is present in many other constitutions).  

Moreover, most of the rights outlined in the Sierra Leone Constitution are limited in their reach due to the language used. These rights are provided for only under the context of “due regard to the resources of the state” (s 8(3)(c) and 8(3)(d)) or only being provided to the people “when practicable” (s 9(1)(c) and 9(2)(c)). These statements aren’t interpreted elsewhere in the Constitution, thereby allowing the government to neglect to provide the rights outlined in the Constitution with the reasoning that there simply aren’t sufficient resources. The government recently instituted free quality education as a policy directive and not as an enforceable constitutional right. While the Constitution requires the government to work toward providing these rights, it is not clear who decides when doing so is “practicable”.

An even bigger issue, however, is that all the rights outlined in the second chapter of the Constitution are limited by the final section of that chapter, s 14, which strips them of any real power. This section reads: “. . . the provisions contained in this chapter shall not confer legal rights and shall not be enforceable in any court of law . . .”, meaning that under the current Constitution, the rights provided are not justiciable. 

Section 14 has the effect of not guaranteeing any citizens socio-economic rights, which is inconsistent with what the ICESCR provides. While the ICESCR does not require governments to guarantee the rights outlined in the treaty, it does require governments to work, particularly with legislative measures, toward providing those rights. The current Sierra Leone Constitution outlines rights that the government values, but provides no mechanisms for holding the government accountable if they don’t provide them. This inconsistency between the two documents weakens the strength of both, and results in a lack of citizen’s empowerment to demand their rightful socio-economic rights through the courts.

Conclusion 

The need for a Constitution that respects and guarantees these rights is particularly important after the devastating conflict that ripped the nation apart. The protection of basic socio-economic rights is fundamental to the protection of human rights, particularly when the vast majority of citizens in the country live in abject poverty. There is an ongoing constitutional review process that has concluded consultations and made recommendations to the government. These include substantial recommendations to include socio-economic rights in a future Constitution. The process has stalled, but adopting a new Constitution with these present recommendations will solve some of the concerns raised in this article and set Sierra Leone to break from the one-party spirited constitutional provisions in its present national Constitution to a more progressive and purposive democratic Constitution. A Constitution that will take care of the inadequacies of the present one, and look into the future of a country that is slowly marching towards becoming a beaming democratic nations with astute egalitarian credentials. Additionally, there is a clear nexus between the government providing citizens their basic socio-economic needs and citizens being able to exercise their civil and political rights. Socio-economic rights are the foundational basis for all other human rights, and thus it is imperative that they are guaranteed by the Constitution. This guarantee, however, has no meaning without justiciability. A Constitution that promises certain provisions but does not provide a means for the government to be held accountable for actually providing them is not a strong Constitution in which citizens can put their faith. Empowering citizens to demand what they deserve through the justiciability of the rights provided in their Constitution would be a fundamental shift toward progress in Sierra Leone.

Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai Esq is the executive director of Society for Democratic Initiatives, Sierra Leone (SDI) and a constitutional lawyer in Sierra Leone. He is the Acting Head of Department, Department of Law, Fourah Bay College, University of Sierra Leone. His recent publication is titled Freedom of Information Law and Good Governance: the Curse of Corruption in Sierra Leone published by Palgave Macmillan: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007%2F978-3-030-83658-0.

Suggested Citation: Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, ‘Guaranteeing Socio-Economic Rights in the Constitution: A Case for Sierra Leone’ IACL-AIDC Blog (8 November 2021) https://blog-iacl-aidc.org/spotlight-on-africa/2021/11/8/guaranteeing-socio-economic-rights-in-the-constitution-a-case-for-sierra-leone.