In concluding Human Rights month, civil society organisations, mining-affected communities, grassroots movements, and legal advocates have come together to take a necessary intervention in the struggle for justice, dignity, and genuine democracy in South Africa and across the Global South by co-developing a Model Law for the Right to Say No. This transformative legal framework seeks to fundamentally shift the balance of power from extractive industries and complicit state actors back to the people.
The Model Law is not merely a technical legal instrument. It is the product of lived experiences, resistance, and collective vision. It emerges from years of struggle by communities who have borne the devastating social, economic, and environmental consequences of extractivism, often without their consent, and frequently against their will.
Across South Africa, communities residing in mineral-rich areas continue to face dispossession, environmental degradation, violence, and economic exclusion. Despite constitutional guarantees and progressive legal frameworks, the reality on the ground reveals a persistent pattern: communities are consulted superficially, if at all, while decisions about mining and development are made in boardrooms and government offices far removed from those most affected.
The right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC), a principle recognised in international law, has been routinely undermined or ignored. Instead of meaningful participation, communities are subjected to coercion, manipulation, and, in some cases, outright intimidation. Activists who speak out against mining projects face threats, criminalisation, and even assassination.
The Model Law for the Right to Say No directly confronts this systemic injustice. It affirms that communities are not passive stakeholders but rights-holders with the authority to determine their own development pathways.
What does a model law mean
At its core, the Model Law enshrines the unambiguous right of communities to withhold consent from mining and other extractive projects that affect their land, livelihoods, culture, environment, and futures.
- Communities are rights-holders.
- Communities have the right to say no protected in law
- Communities are active participants and decision-makers in development projects on their land
- Communities are protected from dispossession and resource grabs
- Communities can determine their own development futures
Grounded in struggle and solidarity
This Model Law is not an abstract legal concept; it is grounded in the real and ongoing struggles of communities across the country. From rural villages like Xolobeni resisting mining on ancestral land, to informal settlements fighting for basic services and environmental safety, the demand is clear: nothing about us, without us.
For years, communities have organised, mobilised, and taken legal action to assert their rights. Landmark court victories such as the Baleni and the Maledu judgements have affirmed the necessity of community consent, yet these gains have not been consistently enforced or respected. The Model Law builds on these struggles, consolidating lessons learned and providing a comprehensive framework for systemic change that guarantees consent rights for communities.
The introduction of the Model Law also represents a broader critique of the dominant development paradigm, one that prioritises profit over people, and extraction over sustainability.
Mining companies often promise jobs, infrastructure, and economic growth. However, the reality for many communities is starkly different: polluted water sources, degraded agricultural land, increased inequality, deepened poverty, and violence. The benefits of extraction are concentrated in the hands of a few, while the costs are borne by the many.
The Model Law challenges this model by asserting that development must be people-centred, democratic, and ecologically sustainable. It opens space for communities to imagine and pursue alternative futures, ones that prioritise care, livelihoods, and environmental stewardship.
A call to the government and policymakers
We call on the South African government to take this Model Law seriously and initiate legislative reform that aligns with its principles.
The government has a constitutional obligation to respect, protect, and fulfil the rights of all people. This includes the right to dignity, equality, and a healthy environment. It also includes the duty to ensure meaningful public participation in decisions that affect communities.
Adopting the Model Law would be a significant step towards fulfilling these obligations. It would demonstrate a commitment to democratic governance, human rights, and social justice.
We also call on Members of Parliament, provincial legislatures, and local government representatives to engage with the Model Law and to champion its principles within their respective spheres of influence.
An invitation to civil society and the public
The introduction of the Model Law is only the beginning. Its success will depend on widespread awareness, mobilisation, and collective action.
We invite civil society organisations, trade unions, faith-based groups, scholar-activists, and the broader public to engage with the Model Law, disseminate its content, and support campaigns for its adoption.
This is a tool for advocacy, education, and empowerment. It is a resource that can be used to strengthen community organising, inform legal strategies, and build solidarity across struggles.
Reclaiming power, reimagining the future
The Model Law for the Right to Say No represents a bold and necessary step towards reclaiming power and reimagining the future. It is a declaration that communities will no longer be silenced, sidelined, or sacrificed in the name of development.
At a time of deepening inequality, ecological crisis, and democratic erosion, this initiative offers a progressive people-centred pathway towards justice, accountability, and hope.
We stand with all communities who are asserting their right to say no and their right to say yes to alternative visions of development rooted in dignity, equity, and sustainability.
The time has come to listen. The time has come to act. The time has come to respect the right to say no.
For more information, you can download our booklet below.
Issued by:
The Right to Say No Campaign, a South African network of communities and popular formations fighting in defence of their land, where there is self-organised resistance to extractivism – the massive-scale extraction and exploitation of natural resources for profit. The campaign is mobilising against systematic dispossession of our land, the grabbing of our natural resources and the superexploitation by transnational corporations in their greed for profits.
