Excerpt: When justice is delayed, it isn’t just a procedural glitch — it’s a direct assault on accountability. For over five months, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has failed to release its merits decision in Van Heerden v Republic of South Africa, despite clear legal obligations. Liberty Fighters Network, representing the complainants, has taken the matter to the Pan African Parliament in a bold stand against bureaucratic silence. This is not merely about one case. It’s about a growing pattern where continental institutions turn their backs on the very people they are meant to serve. And yet, while others remain silent, we speak up — without financial backing, without government aid, and without charging a cent. If you believe in truth without compromise and justice without price tags, support our work with a voluntary donation. Together, we can remind the system that the people are watching — and we will not go away quietly.
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For the past several years, Liberty Fighters Network (LFN) has stood at the forefront of a people’s struggle for justice — not for accolades, but because truth matters.
One of our most critical cases, Communication 747/2021: Jacobus Stephanus van Heerden v Republic of South Africa, was brought before the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) after domestic courts failed to uphold the very rights enshrined in the Constitution. The matter, originally lodged in 2019, finally reached the Commission’s 81st Ordinary Session in Banjul, The Gambia, between 17 October and 6 November 2024. It was here that a long-awaited decision on the merits was taken and subsequently included in the Commission’s 2024 Activity Report.
Yet, after the Activity Report was officially adopted by the African Union (AU) during its 38th Summit in February 2025, the ACHPR Secretariat failed — and continues to fail — to transmit the decision to the parties involved. This, despite clear obligations under Rule 120(5) of the Commission’s own Rules of Procedure that the decision must be transmitted to the parties within thirty (30) days of the Assembly’s consideration. That time has long since passed.
Instead of accountability, we are met with silence. Instead of transparency, we are served excuses — excuses which are not only unsupported by the Commission’s own procedural framework but reek of deliberate delay. From insisting on a “Decision of the Executive” that is not required, to completely ignoring our lawful requests, the ACHPR’s actions undermine everything it claims to stand for.
We have formally lodged a complaint with the Pan African Parliament, supported by extensive correspondence evidencing this failure of procedural justice. But we must ask: what does it say about our continental human rights institutions when they become indistinguishable from the very governments they are meant to hold accountable?
LFN does not have the luxury of corporate backers or political favour. We operate entirely on voluntary donations. We assist ordinary South Africans, free of charge, with no expectations in return — precisely because most of them are the ones the system has left behind. We do so not as legal professionals, but as people who believe in the practical application of justice.
This fight — against bureaucracy, state collusion, and institutional silence — is not just ours. It is yours. Every time we expose injustice, it’s because people like you made it possible with your support.
If you believe in the work we do — the cases we take on, the people we stand beside, the systems we challenge — we invite you to support us. Even the smallest voluntary donation helps us keep going, keep fighting, and keep telling the stories they want buried.
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Justice is not a favour. It is a right. And together, we will ensure it remains so.
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