Association pour le Progrès et la Défense des Droits des Femmes Maliennes (APDF) and Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa (IHRDA) v. Republic of Mali, African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, 2018

In Association pour le Progrès et la Défense des Droits des Femmes Maliennes (APDF) and Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa (IHRDA) v. Republic of Mali, the African Court examined whether Mali’s 2011 Persons and Family Code was compatible with the state’s binding obligations under African and international human rights law relating to the protection of women and children. The applicants challenged legislative provisions adopted after political and religious opposition diluted earlier reforms, arguing that the law permitted child marriage, weakened requirements for free and full consent to marriage, and institutionalized discriminatory inheritance rules. The Court found that Mali had violated the Maputo Protocol, the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, and related instruments by failing to set an adequate minimum age of marriage for girls, tolerating unequal marital consent standards, and maintaining legal frameworks that perpetuated harmful traditional practices. It held that cultural, religious, or social considerations cannot justify departures from treaty obligations and ordered Mali to amend its family law to conform with regional human rights standards protecting the dignity, equality, and rights of women and children.