Chapter III: An Evaluation the PAIC and its Article 14
III.3 Paths for the PAIC to reform the African Investment Regime
context of the EU.188 As the author called for the creation of European Investment Regulations and Investment Court, this thesis recommends the establishment of an African Investment Protection Regulation and an African Investment Court to ensure the stability and respect of the Rule of Law for Intra-African Investors.189
Through the creation of such mechanisms, the AU and the PAIC could overcome the double standards it currently created between Intra and Extra-African Investors as argued by Ngobeni.190 This would provide a way for intra-African investors to have access to a form of international arbitration rather than being stuck to domestic courts and their potential instability. Ultimately, only through the creation of an African Investment Protection Regulation and African Investment Court to supplement the implementation of a legally binding version of the PAIC merged to the AfCFTA could allow the PAIC to force change in the African Investment Regime.
Conclusions
This thesis has been conducted with the purpose to evaluate whether Article 14 of the PAIC through its structure modeled on Article XX of the GATT could allow a reform of the international investment regime on the African continent. This paper analyzed the main initiatives undertaken with that goal in Africa since the second half of the 2000s. The Pan African Investment Code was then selected as it is the only continental project solely focused on investment law and a quintessential example of the Africanization of IIL, featuring most of the innovations pushed by that movement.
A comparative study between Article 14 of the PAIC and Article XX of the GATT was performed using the logic of the police powers doctrine in ISDS to compare IIL case law to WTO case law and generate hypotheses on the potential effect of the inclusion of Article XX modeled provisions to Investment treaties. Despite the legal and practical impediments faced by the PAIC, this research and its main conclusions represent a key step towards a greater
190Ibid (n 157).
189Ibid (n 188).
188N Lavranos, ‘The World after the Termination of Intra-EU BITs’ (2020) 5 EILARO 196.
understanding of the work that needs to be achieved to facilitate the promotion of investment and sustainable development on the African continent.
This thesis offers practical recommendations for the African Union. It advises the AU to adopt the PAIC as a legal instrument of the AfCFTA Investment Protocol and use the consequences of the Achmea ruling as an example of processus to harmonize investment treaties at the continental level. This paper encourages African Union members to muster the political will to implement its Article 3(2) of the PAIC191 and generate a termination agreement of Intra-Africa BITs while avoiding retroactive applications to pending Intra-Africa BIT disputes to protect rule of law principles as highlighted by Lavranos.192 It also encourages the establishment of an African Investment Protection Regulation and African Investment Court to ensure certainty and avoid subjecting Intra-African investors to potential domestic courts bias within the African Investment Regime, all the while leaving disputes brought under BITs concluded with Non-African states to ICSID/UNCITRAL jurisdictions.
Finally, from a normative perspective, the completion of this thesis allowed the evaluation of whether the PAIC is suitable for the task of protecting both investments and the regulatory powers of African states. It also provided grounds to generate recommendations for the committees of the African Union currently working on the AfCFTA as a part of the Agenda 2063.193 The arguments put forward by this paper could also have beneficial effects outside of investment law reform debates, by emphasizing how investment treaty drafting can contribute to the pursuit of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
193‘Agenda 2063’ (African Union, September 2015)
192Ibid (n 188).
191Ibid (n 181).
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Appendix 1
Table 1: Comparison of innovations between legal instruments of the new generation of African IIAs
Requirements for investors
Obligations for investors
Limits to substantive legal
protection
Protection of regulatory space
of states
SADC FIP speculative short-term portfolio investments excluded from treaty protection
list of investor obligations such as corporate social
responsibility
Limitation or removal of Fair
and Equitable Treatment (FET)
Codified “Right to Regulate” matters of health, safety or
environmental concerns.
COMESA CCIA No innovation No innovation Limitation or removal of Fair
and Equitable Treatment (FET)
General exceptions clause
for matters of national security,
public morals, human, animal or
plant life or health, protection