Zambia Climate Case Dismissed on Jurisdictional Grounds

A recent judgment from Zambia’s Constitutional Court looks at a question that comes up often in climate governance: what happens after a climate law is passed, and who can hold the government to account if implementation lags behind.

The case was brought by Climate Action Professionals Zambia, a group focused on climate awareness and advocacy. It centred on the Green Economy and Climate Change Act, No. 18 of 2024, a law designed to establish Zambia’s institutional framework for addressing climate change. The Act provides for a number of specific mechanisms, including those under sections 18, 34 and 39, which relate to core elements of the country’s climate governance architecture. It was enacted in December 2024 but only brought into force through a commencement order in October 2025.

Shortly after commencement, the organisation sought clarification from the government as to whether these statutory mechanisms had been operationalised. The response indicated that implementation was ongoing. The organisation nonetheless proceeded to court, arguing that the State’s failure to establish and implement these mechanisms amounted to a breach of Article 257(g) of the Constitution, which requires the State, in managing the environment and natural resources, to “establish and implement mechanisms that address climate change” (Judgment, p. 12).

The government’s position rested on a different reading of both the Constitution and the Act. It argued that Article 257(g) sets out a general obligation, not a set of immediately enforceable, time-bound duties tied to each statutory mechanism. It further pointed to the structure of the Green Economy and Climate Change Act itself, suggesting that the creation of institutions and systems under sections 18, 34 and 39 is part of a broader legislative scheme that necessarily unfolds over time, depending on administrative capacity and available resources (Judgment, p. 7).

The Court approached the matter by focusing on Article 128 of the Constitution, which defines its jurisdiction. The central question, as framed by the Court, was whether the petition raised a constitutional issue requiring interpretation of the Constitution, or whether it was in substance a dispute about compliance with legislation (Judgment, p. 11). That distinction proved decisive.

In its reasoning, the Court emphasised that the mechanisms relied on by the petitioner “are creations of the GECCA under sections 18, 34 and 39 of that Act” (Judgment, p. 13). While Article 257(g) imposes a general duty on the State, it “does not prescribe the specific mechanisms relied upon by the Petitioner” (Judgment, p. 13). As a result, determining whether those mechanisms had been established or implemented would require an assessment of statutory compliance, not constitutional interpretation. The Court therefore concluded that the matter did not fall within its jurisdiction under Article 128 and dismissed the petition on that basis (Judgment, p. 15).

This reasoning has a number of implications. It draws a clear line between constitutional provisions that articulate general duties and the legislative instruments that give those duties concrete form. Even where a constitutional obligation exists, once Parliament has enacted a detailed framework, disputes about how that framework is carried out may be treated as questions of statutory performance rather than constitutional compliance.

It also underscores the role of commencement in legislative design. The petitioner argued that obligations arose upon publication of the Act, while the Court’s reasoning reflects the legal significance of the commencement order, which brought the Act into operation only in October 2025. This sequencing matters for assessing when duties under the Act can realistically be said to arise.

At the same time, the judgment leaves open how Article 257(g) might be interpreted in a different case. The Court did not reject the existence of a constitutional duty to address climate change. Instead, it held that the present dispute did not require it to interpret that duty in concrete terms. Questions about the content, timing, and enforceability of Article 257(g) therefore remain unresolved.

A full legal analysis of this case is available in the Climate Court database.