Capacitating Civil Society Actors to Advance Digital Rights in Africa

By Paul Kimumwe |

Internet freedom in Africa has been on the decline over the past years with several countries continually adopting repressive measures that curtail civil liberties. Many governments have embraced digital authoritarianism, which has resulted in criminalisation of speech online, internet disruptions, arrests and prosecution of social media users, and abuse of citizens’ data rights, thus undermining free expression and civic participation.

Several…

Botswana Government Waters Down Phone Tapping Bill After Public Outcry

News update |

GABORONE, BOTSWANA —  Following public outrage, Botswana’s government has revised a controversial spy bill which would have allowed investigators to intercept private communications without a court order. Under the revised bill, tapping private conversations now becomes an offense.

Botswana’s government removed controversial clauses in the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Bill, presented to parliament last month. The initial bill allowed investigators to…

Civil Society Organisations Call For a Full Integration of Human Rights in The Deployment of Digital Identification Systems

Press Release |

The Principles on Identification for Sustainable Development (the Principles), the creation of which was facilitated by the World Bank’s Identification for Development (ID4D) initiative in 2017, provide one of the few attempts at global standard-setting for the development of digital identification systems across the world. They are endorsed by many global and regional organizations (the “Endorsing Organizations”) that…

Centre for Human Rights and CIPESA Conduct Study on Civil Society in the Context of the Digital Age in Africa

By Center for Human Rights and CIPESA |

The study on Civil society in the digital age in Africa: identifying threats and mounting pushbacks was undertaken by the Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretroia and the Collaboration on International ICT Policy in East and Southern Africa (CIPESA) to explore the extent of state-sponsored digital challenges that the civil society in Africa is faced with. It…

African Civil Society Urged to Take Active Role in ICANN

By Marilyn Vernon,

Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) are a key player in the multi-stakeholder model of internet governance. However, civil society has been absent from discussions on the technical coordination of the internet domain name system (DNS) mechanisms.

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