On June 30th, 2023, the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (GI-ESCR) held a side event to the 53rd regular session of the Human Rights Council titled “Human Rights Obligations to Provide Public Education - Strengthening the Right to Education for All: Introducing the Abidjan Principles’ Commentary”. 

The objective of the panel discussion was to introduce the recently published expert commentaries on the Abidjan Principles and foster a discussion of their continued relevance for realising the right to free, quality and inclusive public education for all.  

Delphine Dorsi, Director of the Right to Education Initiative (RTE), chaired the discussion. and included the following speakers: 

- Zsuzsanna Nyitray, Program Officer on the Right to Education, Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (GI-ESCR): Introducing the Abidjan Principles and the Commentary. 

- Sandra Fredman, Professor of the Laws of the British Commonwealth and the USA, University of Oxford) – Equality and non-discrimination in the application of the Abidjan Principles. 

- Roman Zinigrad, Assistant Professor of Law at the American University of Paris: Obligations to Respect, Protect, and Fulfil the Right to Education in the Context of Private Involvement in education. 

- Farida Shaheed, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education: Reflections on the continued relevance on the Abidjan Principles for guiding States regarding their human rights obligations to ensure the right to free, quality, inclusive, public education for all. 

"Education is not a commodity. We hear much about Public-Private Partnerships; this is not a solution to bad governance. The solution is better governance, not PPPs." Farida Shaheed, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education.

The Abidjan Guiding Principles on the human rights obligations of States to provide public education and regulate private actors’ involvement in education (Abidjan Principles), adopted in February 2019 by a group of experts on the right to education, unpack the complex legal architecture of the right to education, including the provision of public education, the regulation of private actors and the various financing arrangements for education. To advance the understanding of the Abidjan Principles and thus support their practical application, several experts involved in their drafting process committed to providing the reasonings and justifications behind them.  The first pieces of these legal commentaries were published by the Oxford Human Rights Hub in May this year. 

30 people in person attended the event, and 30 people were following the conversation on-line.