By Chemtai Kirui | phillykirui@gmail.com
When African governments signed onto the Belém Action Mechanism (BAM) at COP30 in Brazil last year, they made a high stake promise: the continent’s massive green energy expansion would protect its most vulnerable workers.
Now, legal experts and policy analysts warn that the clock is ticking on whether that promise will hold.
With a March 15 deadline approaching for countries to submit their national implementation plans, the focus has shifted from political rhetoric to legal accountability.
At stake is whether protections for informal workers, who make up more than 80 percent of Africa’s workforce according to the International Labour Organization (ILO), will be woven into the energy strategies reshaping the continent’s economic future.
During a cross-border briefing convened by the Media for Environment, Science, Health and Agriculture (MESHA) in February 2026, over 80 journalists and policy specialists examined how international commitments are filtering into domestic law.
“It’s not enough that these principles are agreed upon internationally,” said Teresa Anderson, Global Lead on Climate Justice at ActionAid International.
“The years after COP30 require us to use these outcomes to deliver action on the ground.”
The landscape of climate litigation changed significantly following the International Court of Justice (ICJ) Advisory Opinion on the Obligations of States in Respect of Climate Change.
By linking a state’s “due diligence” duties to the 1.5°C temperature threshold, the ruling transformed political aspirations into potential legal benchmarks.
Domestic courts can now use these benchmarks to assess whether governments are doing enough to protect their populations from climate related harm.
Legal scholars, including Professor Daniel Bradlow of the University of Pretoria, argue that the ICJ’s 2025 ruling creates a “legal collision course” between a state’s duty to pay its creditors and its court-affirmed duty to shield its population from climate catastrophe.
Writing for the South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA), Bradlow suggested this provides a legal basis for African nations to prioritize climate adaptation over debt servicing through innovative mechanisms like debt-for climate swaps.
Despite the urgent need for a “just transition,” financing remains a bottleneck. Research from ActionAid’s 2024 How the Finance Flows report estimates that only 2.8 percent of multilateral climate mitigation finance over the past decade has supported just transition measures.
Essentially, only one dollar out of every 35 reaches the communities most exposed to the energy shift.
Particular scrutiny is now falling on projects linked to Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, which governs international carbon markets.
In coastal and forested areas, carbon credit initiatives have occasionally restricted land access for fishers and smallholder farmers.
Imali Ngusale, Strategic Lead at the African Centre for Health, Climate and Gender Justice Alliance (ACHCGA), warned that infrastructure-heavy strategies often fail to account for indirect social impacts.
“Climate change deepens existing gender inequalities by interacting with social, economic, and political power structures,” she said.
This gap is most visible in the “blue economy.” In coastal Kenya, women led mangrove restoration projects are proving that community oversight is a practical necessity, not just a social gesture.
In Kwale County, for instance, women’s groups involved in the Mikoko Pamoja carbon credit project successfully demanded a seat at the table after initially being excluded from revenue sharing decisions.
Audrey Masitsa of Mission Inclusion emphasized that local oversight is vital for the longevity of green projects. “Giving local stakeholders formal oversight roles is a practical necessity to prevent the social unrest that could derail multi-million-dollar investments,” she noted.
As preparations advance for COP31 in Antalya, with Türkiye hosting and Australia presiding, negotiators face growing pressure to turn ‘just transition’ promises into enforceable domestic policy.
The MESHA forum concluded with a clear consensus: the real test of Africa’s energy transition has moved beyond multilateral halls to domestic legal systems.
The durability of the continent’s green investment surge will depend on whether projects are deemed legally robust by local courts and socially defensible by the communities they serve.
