A/HRC/37/53
financial register60 and those proposed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development (OECD) 61 to effectively combat tax evasion and adopt joint strategies to
pressure States providing tax havens to cease from doing so.
137. Multinational corporations in extractive industries, agro-business and real estate
destroy and displace housing, livelihood and communities. States should adopt laws to hold
transnational corporations that are domiciled or registered within their territory, as well as
those that are active within their territory, accountable to the right to housing and other
human rights.
138. Many trade and investment agreements allow investors to sue States for new
regulatory measures, even if they are necessary to ensure the right to housing. Housing
strategies should ensure that such agreements recognize the right to adequate housing and
protect any measures adopted to fulfil human rights obligations from challenges by
investors. New types of trade and investment agreements that protect and promote the right
to housing and other human rights should be negotiated.
In practice
139. In 2013 in Nigeria, during a period in which Lagos State was receiving World Bank
funding for infrastructure and upgrading, the Government forcibly evicted 9,000 people
from the Badia East community. The eviction was contrary to World Bank safeguard
policies with which the Government had agreed to comply. The Social and Economic
Rights Action Center submitted a request to the World Bank Inspection Panel asking it to
investigate the evictions. Instead, the Panel initiated a pilot approach to pursue negotiated
solutions with the community. This resulted in a resettlement action plan that provided
some compensation and a grievance mechanism. Members of the community involved in
the original complaint were not satisfied with the agreement. However, the Panel declined
to proceed with the investigation.62
140. The European Union has developed a list of 17 countries that act as tax havens and
is considering the use of sanctions against those countries if the problem is not addressed. 63
141. The Participatory Development Programme in Urban Areas between Germany and
Egypt, ongoing since 2004, is one example of an innovative community-driven
development assistance project. It focuses on the upgrading of informal areas in the Greater
Cairo region by supporting the implementation of participatory methodologies for urban
upgrading with local government and civil society organizations. 64
142. United Cities and Local Governments, an umbrella organization of local
governments across the world, adopted the Bogota Commitment and Action Agenda, which
suggests innovative approaches to integrate local government into international
development mechanisms and institutions in order to ensure the realization of the New
Urban Agenda, the Paris Agreement and other international agreements. 65
143. United Cities and Local Governments has also joined with the OHCHR and the
Special Rapporteur to initiate “The Shift”, a new multi-stakeholder, international movement
that recognizes that the global challenges to the right to housing require a global human
rights-based response.
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62
63
64
65
20
See World Inequality Lab, “World Inequality Report 2018” (Berlin, 2017), pp. 15–16. Available from
http://wir2018.wid.world/files/download/wir2018-summary-english.pdf.
See OECD, Base Erosion and Profit Shifting, (Paris, 2013). Available from
www.oecd.org/ctp/BEPSActionPlan.pdf.
See World Bank, “Lagos Metropolitan Development and Governance Project” (Washington, D.C.,
2015). Available from http://projects.worldbank.org/P071340/lagos-metropolitan-developmentgovernance-project?lang=en.
See Council of the European Union, “The EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes”
(Brussels, 5 December 2017). Available from
www.consilium.europa.eu/media/31945/st15429en17.pdf.
See http://egypt-urban.net/about/.
See United Cities and Local Governments, “The Bogota Commitment and Action Agenda” (Bogota,
October 2016). Available from www.bogota2016.uclg.org/sites/default/files/bogota_commitment.pdf.
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