ABSTRACT
This analytical chapter explores the contentious and divisive issue of whether the ICC unfairly targets Africa in a world awash with human rights abuses. The fact that of the 14 investigations done by the Court, eight are African (Uganda, DRC, CAR, CAR II, Darfur (Sudan), Kenya, Libya, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali and Burundi). The issue is addressed first from a positivist perspective where Africa must celebrate being prioritised by the ICC and then from a decolonial perspective where the Court is viewed as an instrument of powerful western nations and their interests. Using the decolonial perspective, he argues that the targeting of Africa is part of the colonial project which started with slavery and is now in the coloniality phase. The Global South was ravaged by the three phases of the empire: (1) the political-economic empire, (2) the commercial empire and (3) now the cognitive empire, thereby placing it on ‘shacky grounds’. Three groups emerge, one in favour of the ICC and the work it is doing in Africa, another one completely against the ICC and the final one believing that the ICC is a good institution doing a bad job.
