(2017) 1 African Human Rights Yearbook 173 issued its first ruling in 2009 and the Rules of Procedure of the Court were adopted in 2010. Until now, only a handful of states20 have made the declaration recognising the competence of the African Court to receive cases brought by individuals, which was the most significant development in human rights protection in Europe. A feature of the African human rights system with a Commission as well as a Court is that the two organs are quite independent from one another. There is even a certain competition between them, even if the trend is toward greater co-operation, as the Court will hopefully assume a greater role. Work is ongoing21 concerning the possibility for the Court to deal with international criminal cases, following the criticism – very common in Africa – that the International Criminal Court is prejudiced towards Africa.22 Until September 2017, the African Court has issued decisions in 38 cases and given three interpretations of judgements; it has 88 pending cases.23 This number is very low considering the size of the African continent and we can see that the degree of enforcement varies. For instance, recent decisions by the Court show partial, almost full or no follow-up at all. In the joined Application 9 and 11/2011 Tanganyika Law Society and Legal and Human Rights Centre and Reverend Christopher Mtikila v Tanzania (13 -14 June 2013), Tanzania was ordered to take constitutional, legislative and other measures within a reasonable time to remedy the violations, as well as to publish the judgment in a specified manner. The judgment was published to some extent but no other measures had been taken by the end of 2016.24 In other cases against Tanzania,25 the country had not reported on any measures taken.26 As for Burkina Faso (Zongo & others, Application 13/2011), the country had met with requirements to pay compensation as well as enabled the case in question to be reopened in the national courts, leading to the prosecution for murder of the indicted persons. However, in this case, the country had not adequately published the ruling of the Court.27 A pattern that has been observed is that states often do abide by the obligations set by the specific decision but do not take actions to deal with the underlying root causes of violations. The African Union (AU) shows evidence of potential as a regional integration organisation but has until now fewer accomplishments of 20 Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Mali, Malawi, Tanzania, Tunisia. To this end, the AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government in June 2014 adopted the Protocol on Amendments to the Protocol on the Statute of the African Court of Justice and Human Rights (Malabo Protocol), which includes as an Annex an amendment to the Statute of the African Court, 27 June 2014. As of July 2017, 10 countries had signed but none have ratified the Protocol. 22 http://en.african-court.org/index.php/about-us/jurisdiction (accessed 10 October 2017). This was a common theme brought up by our interlocutors during interviews. 23 http://en.african-court.org/index.php/12-homepage1/1-welcome-to-the-africancourt (accessed 10 October 2017). 24 African Court Activity Report 2016 (EX.CL/999(XXX), 22-27 January 2017 25 Thomas v Tanzania, Application 5/2013 (20 November 2015), Nganyi and 9 Others v Tanzania, Application 6/2013 (18 March 2016) (n 24 above). 26 African Court Activity Report 2016 (n 24 above). 27 African Court Activity Report 2016 (n 24 above). 21