The application of the local remedies rule under the African charter on human and peoples' rights: With a case study of communications from the Niger Delta

The thesis argues that the local remedies rule as applied by the African Commission in the Niger Delta cases in a flexible manner which focused on the Respondent State's obligation to provide effective legal redress rather than the mechanical act of exhaustion of domestic remedies by the petitioner, represents a correct application of the rule in human rights protection and that the African Commission's pronouncements regarding the absence of effective domestic legal remedies in Nigeria facilitated improvements in Nigeria's legal institutions. A flexible approach to the local remedies rule should therefore be applicable in all meritorious communications in the African human rights system.