The recent attacks against African migrants in South Africa have generated widespread condemnation across the continent and beyond. Much of the discussion has focused on governments, diplomacy, immigration policy, and the responsibilities of the South African state. Those discussions are important and necessary.
However, there is another conversation that Africa’s legal community should urgently begin.
While it may be difficult for individual victims to pursue claims directly against the South African state because of well-established principles of sovereign immunity and jurisdictional limitations, that reality should not be mistaken for the absence of accountability.
On the contrary, modern technology may provide Africa with one of the most powerful accountability tools ever available in the history of the continent.
The age in which perpetrators could disappear into violent crowds with complete anonymity is rapidly coming to an end.
Today, thousands of mobile phones, surveillance cameras, livestreams, photographs, social-media posts, geolocation records, and digital communications create an evidentiary trail that did not exist a generation ago. Every assault, every act of looting, every incident of intimidation, every act of arson, and every killing potentially leaves behind evidence capable of identification and verification.
This reality should fundamentally change how Africa responds to xenophobic violence.
Rather than focusing exclusively on state responsibility, legal scholars, prosecutors, investigators, human-rights organizations, and law-enforcement agencies should immediately begin examining mechanisms for identifying individual perpetrators and preserving evidence for future proceedings.
Every available video should be archived.
Every photograph should be preserved.
Every witness statement should be collected.
Every victim should be encouraged to document losses, injuries, and incidents.
Every digital record should be secured before evidence disappears.
The objective is not revenge. The objective is accountability through the rule of law.
Where evidence establishes participation in assault, robbery, murder, destruction of property, intimidation, organized violence, or criminal conspiracy, investigations should follow. Where investigations establish reasonable grounds, prosecutions should follow. Where courts issue lawful warrants, regional and international law-enforcement cooperation should follow.
The central principle is straightforward: criminal responsibility is personal.
Those who organize, direct, encourage, finance, or participate in violent attacks against fellow Africans should not assume that accountability ends when the crowd disperses.
Digital evidence can survive indefinitely.
The individual who today believes that anonymity within a mob provides protection may discover years later that a preserved video recording, a facial comparison, a witness statement, or a social-media post has established his identity and role in criminal conduct.
The legal implications of this reality extend beyond South Africa.
Africa is increasingly interconnected through trade, investment, technology, migration, and regional integration initiatives, including the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). If African citizens are to move, work, invest, and conduct business across the continent, confidence in the rule of law must accompany that movement.
No meaningful vision of African integration can coexist with recurring violence against fellow Africans based solely on nationality.
The legal profession therefore has an important role to play.
Bar associations, law schools, legal aid organizations, prosecutors, human-rights advocates, digital-forensics specialists, and international-law scholars should begin a serious examination of how technology can support evidence gathering, victim documentation, cross-border investigations, and lawful prosecutions.
This is not merely a South African issue.
It is an African rule-of-law issue.
It is a human-rights issue.
It is a governance issue.
And increasingly, it is a technology issue.
The same technological tools that have transformed commerce, communications, banking, and governance can also transform accountability.
Africa should embrace that opportunity.
The message must be clear and unmistakable: those who engage in xenophobic violence should understand that technology will identify them, evidence will preserve their actions, and the law will follow long after the violence has ended.
The era of impunity should not survive the era of digital accountability.
My appeal to Africa’s legal community is therefore simple.
Begin the work now.
Preserve the evidence.
Identify the perpetrators.
Document the crimes.
Support the victims.
Follow the law.
And allow justice, wherever it may ultimately lead, to take its course.
Dr. Michael Buadoo is an International Commercial Law Practitioner, Technology Strategist, and Governance Specialist with expertise in digital transformation, public-sector governance, and international regulatory frameworks.