Implementing legal abortion in Rwanda and its challenges
May 23, 2017

The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (Maputo Protocol) is the main legal instrument for the protection of the rights of women and girls in Africa and the most comprehensive on women’s rights globally. The Protocol went into effect in November 2005, after the minimum 15 of the then 53 African Union member countries ratified it. Today, 49 countries have ratified.

Rwanda signed and ratified the Protocol in 2004 but placed a reservation on Article 14.2.C, which stipulates that countries should “protect the reproductive rights of women by authorizing medical abortion in cases of sexual assault, rape, incest, and where the continued pregnancy endangers the mental and physical health of the mother or the life of the mother or the fetus. It subsequently lifted the reservation in 2012, making Rwanda fully committed to the Protocol.

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