The Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) held its opening Session on Transnational Corporations in Southern Africa in Manzini, Swaziland, on 16-17 August 2016. The PPT analyzed a sample of cases based in Swaziland, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Zambia and Mozambique, regarding corporate intervention in the critical areas of the extractive industries and land grabbing.
In its Statement, the PPT recognizes that the communities are exposed to the intervention on their lands and life by TNCs, being victims, individually and collectively, of severe and systematic violations of their rights to life and human dignity (Download the PPT Statement, August 2016).
On 17 and 18 August 2017, the Tribunal held in Johannesburg its second Session, during which seven new cases were examined, together with the analysis of the experts on the juridical, political and economic framework that determined the broad spectrum of the violations documented. The decision of the Tribunal concerning this second Session is available here (Download the PPT Decision – August 2017).
During its third and final Session, which took place in Johannesburg on 9-11 November 2018, the PPT received detailed reports on 18 cases, submitted in their hearings in Manzini in 2016 and in Johannesburg in 2017. These reports provided substantial proof of the depth, causes, and the personal and institutional responsibilities for the criminal violations of human and peoples’ rights committed by TNCs, in explicit and systematic disregard of national and international obligations. These violations have further aggravated a situation of almost permanent and long-term impunity of the TNCs, even for events which amount to the most severe classification of crimes against humanity according to international law. The decision of the PPT concernig this third final Session includes the Statement of the panel of judges and the Final Judgment, which concludes the whole process.
