ActionAid, with collaboration from wider civil society, has called for International Tribunal supervision for transnational corporations’ compliance and sanctions.

The Country Director, John Nkaw, made this call at the high-profile Africa Regional Intersessional Consultation on the UN Binding Treaty on Business and Human Rights in Accra.

John Nkaw affirmed that international standards governing commercial practices in connection with human rights are urgently needed, and Africa desperately needs to take a more active part in determining how they appear.

The Africa Regional Intersessional Consultation on the UN Binding Treaty on Business and Human Rights was organised with support from the Norwegian Agency for Development Corporation (Norad) to create a common understanding amongst African States of the political relevance of the LBI and come up with a common vision for the next negotiations and on-site.

The meeting seeks to also strengthen cooperation, coordination, and solidarity amongst African States and civil society movements for the realization of the LBI and discuss key articles of the LBI that are critical demands from civil society, social movements, and affected communities in Africa.

The consultation also sought to provide states with an overall legal reading of the new treaty content in comparison with the third draft and textual proposals submitted to the Orient during the nine negotiations.

The Country Director, John Nkaw, noted that ‘’Our engagement in this negotiation process presents an opportunity to reflect a collective African position towards more principled, responsible, and accountable business operations.

"We acknowledge that women the world over are most likely to be employed in the most precarious working environments with the least labour protection, earn the lowest wages, and shoulder the vast majority of the world’s unpaid care work.

"Engaging in the treaty negotiation process presents a critical opportunity for states to demonstrate political will to put gender justice above corporate interests’’.

Explaining the essence of prioritising issues around domestic laws, agroecology, and the primacy of international human rights law, Mr Nkaw reiterated that it is imperative that there be a strong and deliberate gender approach.

He stated this included taking into account the gendered impacts and experiences of women who are directly or indirectly affected by the operations of transnational corporations and affected communities, removing gender-specific barriers to justice that women experience in holding corporations to account and guaranteeing protection for women human rights defenders, especially smallholder farmers in the agro-economic industry.

Additionally, the consultation is very timely, as the issue of modern slavery lingers in the supply chain.

The age-long menace of exploitation and child labour is common in this industry due to the delay of structural International Tribunal supervision of transnational corporations' compliance and sanctions to ensure full respect for human rights.

He emphasised that the operations of businesses can have a profound impact on the rights of people and communities.

While some of these impacts are positive, such as increasing access to employment, they are often negative and include forcible eviction, various forms of labour exploitation, and damage to the environment.

The impacts of this are experienced hardest by women, children, indigenous communities, and other marginalized people.

Collaborating with other CSOs, ActionAid Ghana demanded stern supervision by the International Tribunal of Transnational Corporations' compliance and sanctions to ensure full respect for human rights and the protection of ecosystems.