Legal and regulatory library for African jurisdictions

The laws and regulations you need across African jurisdictions, in one place.

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AI-Assisted Research

Ask legal questions in plain language and receive grounded answers with sources.

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45+

Curated coverage, African countries

Key laws and regulatory instruments, organised and searchable by jurisdiction, area of law, topic and sector.

English translations
Sector collections
Maintained & alerted
The research engine

Read the law as it stands

Acts, regulations and subordinate instruments — consolidated, structured and linked at provision level in selected jurisdictions, the foundation for advanced search and AI-Assisted Research.

Expanding jurisdiction by jurisdiction

Legal research should not begin with a search across dozens of unreliable websites

Legislation across African jurisdictions is fragmented between government websites, official gazettes, regulator portals and documents that are not readily available online — often incomplete, difficult to search, or separated from the amendments and regulations that give them effect.

The Legal & Regulatory Library brings the relevant legal sources into one organised environment, so legal and compliance teams can research legislation across their countries and move from the broad framework to the underlying law.

From legal issue to authoritative source

1
Select the jurisdiction and subject

Choose the relevant country, area of law, topic or sector.

2
Find the applicable legislation

Browse or search the laws and regulatory instruments relevant to your question.

3
Review the legal source

Open the legislation, available translations and related source material.

4
Explore connected instruments

Move between an act, its regulations and amendments — where available.

5
Stay current as the law changes

Maintained and updated, with alerts on changes.

6
Continue your research

Open Practical Guidance, ask AI-Assisted Research, or track selected legislation in an Interactive Legal Universe.

Built by an in-house legal team, supported by in-country experts

Sourced, curated and maintained in-house

The collections are sourced, curated and maintained by Afriwise's in-house legal team, supported by leading in-country law firms and legal experts where relevant.

More than what is readily available online

Afriwise does not rely solely on publicly accessible websites. Its in-country network helps identify and obtain legal and regulatory materials that may not be generally available.

Pan-African by design

Built for organisations operating across multiple African countries, rather than extending a database designed primarily around one mature legal market.

English translations where they matter

Key legislation is available in English translation for jurisdictions where English is not the official legal language.

"Information on official websites is never guaranteed to be correct or recent. Access to primary legislation has proven essential."
Ruth Ward, Head Librarian, Webber Wentzel

Reliable legal AI starts with structured legal sources

Generic AI tools rely on what is published on the public internet — and across many African jurisdictions that information is incomplete, outdated or disconnected from the amendments needed to understand the law correctly.

Afriwise's comprehensive statutory collections provide the structured foundation for its most advanced AI-Assisted Research: the law consolidated, structured and linked at provision level, so answers are grounded in identifiable legal sources, supported by citations — and the law behind the answer stays open for inspection.

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Practical Guidance

Understand how the law works in practice, jurisdiction by jurisdiction.

AI-Assisted Research

Ask legal questions in plain language and receive grounded answers with sources.

Interactive Legal Universe

Define the legislation relevant to your business and track it automatically.

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Find the law across your African footprint

Give your legal and compliance teams one organised starting point for researching laws and regulations across the jurisdictions in which your organisation operates.

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Frequently asked questions

What is the Afriwise Legal & Regulatory Library?
An online legal research resource providing access to laws and regulatory instruments across more than 45 African countries. It combines curated country and topic collections with comprehensive, consolidated statutory collections in selected jurisdictions, searchable by jurisdiction, area of law, topic, sector and keyword.
Is the legal collection exhaustive in every country?
No. The level of coverage varies by jurisdiction. Across 45+ countries, Afriwise provides curated collections of the legislation relevant to key legal topics and sectors. In selected jurisdictions, Afriwise provides more comprehensive statutory coverage containing the broader body of acts, regulations and subordinate instruments.
Are all laws consolidated?
No. Consolidated legislation is available in jurisdictions covered by Afriwise's comprehensive statutory collections. In other jurisdictions, the library presents the principal law and subsequent amending instruments separately.
What is a consolidated law?
A consolidated law incorporates amendments into the text of the principal legislation, so the reader reviews the law as amended without manually combining the original act with each subsequent amendment.
Does the library include regulations and subordinate legislation?
Yes. Regulations and subordinate instruments are included. In the comprehensive statutory collections they are linked to the relevant parent act, so users can navigate the wider statutory framework.
Is the legislation machine-readable?
The comprehensive statutory collections are structured and machine-readable at provision level. The broader curated collections are organised for research but are not all available in the same machine-readable format.
Are English translations available?
Yes. English translations are available for key legislation in a range of jurisdictions where English is not the official legal language.
How is the library kept up to date?
Afriwise's in-house legal team maintains the collection as laws and regulations change, supported by leading in-country law firms and legal experts where relevant. In the comprehensive statutory collections, amendments are incorporated into consolidated texts; in the curated collections, new and amending instruments are added or updated as appropriate.
How does the library support AI-Assisted Research?
The comprehensive statutory collections provide structured legal content that allows Afriwise's AI-Assisted Research to retrieve relevant provisions, definitions, amendments and related instruments. Answers are grounded in identifiable legal sources and supported by citations.
Which areas of law are covered?
The curated collections cover corporate and commercial law, competition, employment and labour, dispute resolution, ICT and data protection, environmental, exchange control, lending and security, investment and market-entry, anti-money laundering, and commercial crime (including anti-bribery, corruption and fraud) — together with immigration, insolvency, insurance, intellectual property, local content and empowerment, M&A, public contracting and projects, real estate, and trade. Coverage varies by country — the Afriwise Coverage page shows which legal subjects are available in each jurisdiction.
Which sector collections are included?
Specialist collections provide additional depth for sectors including financial technology, telecommunications, energy, gaming, food safety and more. Sector coverage varies by country — the Afriwise Coverage page shows which sector collections are available in each jurisdiction.
Can I see exactly what is covered in each country?
Yes. The Afriwise Coverage page shows the countries, legal subjects, translations and level of statutory depth currently available.