This report assesses whether and how the development of private schools in Ghana, Kenya and Uganda is enabling or impairing the realisation of children and young people’s human rights, particularly their right to education. The report makes use of the Abidjan Principles: Guiding Principles on the human rights obligations of States to provide public education and to regulate private involvement in education (AP) in order to analyse national education laws and policies, together with primary and secondary data. The analysis concludes that Ghana, Kenya and Uganda are not fully meeting their obligations to provide free and quality education, partly due to the underfunding of the sector in these three countries, and the private sector growing as a result. This growth of the private sector is causing and entrenching social inequalities, leading to stratification and huge disparities of education opportunities. Ghana, Kenya and Uganda must fulfil their obligations to provide free public education of the highest attainable quality using the maximum of available resources. Increasing the size, share, sensitivity and scrutiny of the budget is necessary to give the necessary resources to public schools and to adequately regulate private providers.