Human rights organization welcomes Central African Republic ratification of women’s rights treaty News
Ezequiel_Octaviano / Pixabay
Human rights organization welcomes Central African Republic ratification of women’s rights treaty

Amnesty International on Friday lauded the Central African Republic’s ratification of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, also known as the Maputo Protocol.

Amnesty International Senior Researcher Abdoulaye Diarra praised the move as a “welcome and long-awaited step in promoting and protecting women and girls’ rights in the country, including from all forms of gender-based violence.” Diarra added:

Central African authorities must now follow through to take necessary measures to ensure the full implementation of the Maputo Protocol by adopting a comprehensive law to address GBV and promote gender equality, strengthening the justice system, improving support services for survivors, and raising awareness in communities, including in rural areas.”

The Maputo Protocol entered into force in 2005 and “underlie[s] the commitment of the African States to ensure the full participation of African women as equal partners in Africa’s development.” The Maputo Protocol broadly defines “discrimination against women” as “any distinction, exclusion or restriction or any differential treatment based on sex and whose objectives or effects compromise or destroy the recognition, enjoyment or the exercise by 4women [sic], regardless of their marital status, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in all spheres of life.”

The Maputo Protocol also emphasizes that women should retain agency over their reproductive health, including “the right to control their fertility…to choose any method of contraception [and] to be protected against sexually transmitted infections.” As of August 28, 2025, 46 out of the 55 African Union member countries have ratified the treaty. Neither Egypt nor Morocco has signed or ratified the protocol.

According to the United Nations Population Fund, about 60 percent of births in the Central African Republic are not attended by skilled health personnel, the prevalence of gender mutilation among women aged 15 to 49 is 22 percent, and 61 percent of girls are married before age 18. 21 percent of individuals have also experienced intimate partner violence in the past year as of 2018.

Amnesty International also urged Niger and Chad, the two countries in West and Central Africa that have not yet ratified the Maputo Protocol, to do so immediately. The significance of the treaty is highly relevant, especially as ongoing atrocities continue to be perpetrated in places like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan, and Nigeria.

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