Lawyers For Human Rights

26/05/2026

SECTION27 and Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr are hosting a panel discussion to launch a new joint publication: A Practitioner’s Guide to Constitutional Remedies, a practical resource exploring how constitutional rights can be enforced through remedies.

This new guide unpacks how people can seek justice through constitutional remedies, using real court cases, expert insights, and lessons from public interest litigation in South Africa. From and dignity to accountability and human rights, the report explores how courts can help turn rights on paper into in practice.

25/05/2026

📢 JOINT STATEMENT | Statement of outrage against the weaponisation of xenophobia and the brutal and unlawful treatment of migrants, including refugees and asylum seekers in SA

On this Africa Day 2026, more than 46 civil society organisations, social movements, legal organisations, faith based institutions and activists have come together to condemn the growing weaponisation of xenophobia and the brutal and unlawful treatment of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in South Africa.

We reject fear, violence, scapegoating and mob justice. We stand for dignity, constitutionalism, accountability and Pan African solidarity!

An injury to one is an injury to all!✊

Undersigned Organizations and individuals:

Lawyers for Human Rights, Union Against Hunger, Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia - KAAX, Consortium for Refugees and Migrants South Africa (CoRMSA), Southern Africa Litigation Centre, Wits School of Lawl Clinic, The International Labour Research and Information Group (ILRIG), Dr Dale McKinley, Africa Grassroots Healing Initiatives, Centre for Applied Legal Studies, Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town, Zabalaza Pathways Institute,Ntirhisano Community Centre (NCC), groundWork, Friends of the Earth South Africa, Right2Protest Project, The Fruit Basket, Media Review Network , Afesis, Be True to Me, The Auwal Socio-economic Research Institute (ASRI), Action Campaign (TAC), Section27, The Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, Zabalaza for Socialism, Free Basotho Movement, Collective Voices for Health Access, Legal Resources Centre, Amnesty International South Africa South Africa, Initiative for Strategic Litigation in Africa (ISLA), African Red Cross Society (SARCS), Socio-Economic Rights Institute of South Africa (SERI), Tabitha Paine, Congolese Civil Society of South Africa, African Solidarity Campaign, Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (PSC), United Front, Jesuit Refugee Service Southern Africa (JRS), Neighbors, Black Sash, Sisonke Revolutionary Movement, Reclaim the City, Claremont Main Road Mosque, Refugee Social Services (RSS), Palestine Solidarity Alliance, Kensington Palestine Solidarity Group (KPSG).

25/05/2026

Happy Africa Day 🌍

Today we celebrate the continent and its people. We also stand with the communities across Africa who are fighting to protect their land, their water, and their right to exist on their own terms.

In Northern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, communities in Somkhele have faced years of opencast coal mining - exhumed ancestral graves, black water running from the taps, crops dying in coal dust, and violence used to silence those who resist. In 2020, community leader Ma Fikile Ntshangase was shot dead in her home for opposing the mine's expansion.

Expert psychological reports commissioned by All Rise found that 78% of residents interviewed are living with continuous traumatic stress. Not in the past - right now, today.

Africa Day is about remembering what African communities are still owed: the right to their land, their culture, and a future that has not been traded away.

ALL RISE - Attorneys for Climate and Environmental Justice stands with these communities in court and beyond.

24/05/2026

📢 JOINT PRESS STATEMENT | PLASTIC VIEW ON FIRE AGAIN📢

At least one person has reportedly lost their life following the devastating fire at Plastic View informal settlement in Pretoria East, leaving vulnerable families displaced and traumatised.

For more than two decades, residents have lived under unsafe and undignified conditions despite repeated court interventions directing the City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality to provide a lawful and dignified housing solution!

This tragedy is not accidental, it is the consequence of systemic neglect, deepening inequality, and the continued failure to address South Africa’s housing crisis. People are dying because poor communities continue to be forced to live in overcrowded informal settlements without adequate housing, electricity, water infrastructure, fire prevention measures, or emergency services despite years of court orders, warnings, and promises.

The undersigned organisations stand in solidarity with all affected residents and are calling for urgent humanitarian intervention, accountability, and immediate housing solutions for all.

Read the full statement below!

22/05/2026

⚠️ Important Alert: Beware of False Information Circulating Online

22/05/2026

📢JOINT PRESS STATEMENT | IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Lawyers for Human Rights and the Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town note the judgment of the Constitutional Court of South Africa delivered on 12 May 2026 in Director-General, Department of Home Affairs and Others v Irankunda and Another, which clarifies the legal position on subsequent asylum applications under South Africa’s Refugees Act.

The Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town, represented by Lawyers for Human Rights, participated in the proceedings as amicus curiae (friend of the court).

Read the Judgement here: https://www.lhr.org.za/lhr-resources/director-general-department-of-home-affairs-and-others-v-irankunda-and-another/

22/05/2026

JOINT STATEMENT | SECTION27, Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia - KAAX
Equal Education Equal Education Law Centre Lawyers For Human Rights and the Children's Institute condemn xenophobic threats and intimidation targeting migrant learners and families in Gauteng and KZN.

We call on government to protect communities and ensure every child can attend school safely.

Read full statement here: https://section27.org.za/2026/05/equal-education-law-centre-equal-education-childrens-institute-section27-kopanang-africa-against-xenophobia-and-lawyers-for-human-rights-condemn-the-recent-wave-of-xenophobia/

22/05/2026

22/05/2026

JOINT STATEMENT: Equal Education Law Centre, Equal Education, Children’s Institute, SECTION27, Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia, and Lawyers for Human Rights condemn the recent wave of xenophobia

21/05/2026

Human rights groups condemn escalating xenophobic violence and intimidation targeting migrant communities in Gauteng and KwaZulu Natal.

Read more here:
https://www.conviction.co.za/recent-wave-of-xenophobic-violence/