The Challenges Faced By Truth Commissions as a Result of the Selection and Appointment of Truth Commissioners
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Date
2017
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
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Publisher
University of the Western Cape
Abstract
As states continue to rapidly transition from conflict or autocracy to democracy, there has
been need to address past gross human rights violations. To address these past egregious
violations, transitioning countries often relied on immunities and prosecutions. However,
prosecutions and amnesties presented several challenges that necessitated a recourse to
truth and reconciliation commissions (hereafter TRCs). Since then, TRCs have evolved to be
an essential accountability mechanism in transitional justice.
Given the important role that TRCs play in transitioning countries, the composition of TRCs
should be of credible character in the eye of the public. The selected and appointed truth
commissioners (hereafter commissioners) play a key role in the truth-finding process and
the importance of having a constraint-free and reliable work plan of selecting these
commissioners cannot be overestimated. However, in practice the selection and
appointment of the commissioners has proven to be a challenging exercise.
Description
Magister Legum - LLM (Criminal Justice and Procedure)
Keywords
Truth Commission, Truth Commissioner, Selection, Appointment, Best Practices, Competing interests, Integrity, Impartial, Public participation, Consultative process, Representativeness