Twenty years ago, the African Union adopted a landmark, broad-sweeping treaty that serves as a road map for advancing gender equality across the continent known as the Maputo Protocol.
The legally binding agreement covers a wide range of issues such as reproductive health, inheritance for widows, political participation, and gender-based violence.
But its most polarized element is on abortion access — a provision that those pushing for the legalization of abortion say shouldn’t be controversial because it relates so directly to saving lives. Unsafe abortion is a leading cause of maternal deaths in sub-Saharan Africa.