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Published: 26 February 2021

Tamika Thumbran |  South Africa 

Tamika Thumbiran is the In-House Counsel within the Litigation and Implementation Unit at the Centre for Human Rights. In this role, she represents the Centre in strategic impact litigation before domestic, regional, and international forums, advancing a broad spectrum of human rights. Her work also includes legal advocacy initiatives that seek to promote systemic change and strengthen human rights protections across the African continent.

Tamika also serves as the Project Co-ordinator for the Centre’s Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights in Africa (SRHR) Programme. In this capacity, she oversees the implementation of projects aimed at promoting sexual and reproductive justice, with a focus on legal reform, gender equality, and access to health services.

Tamika is also a practising member of the Johannesburg Society of Advocates and an alumnus of the Mandela Washington Fellowship and the Young African Leaders Initiative Network. She first joined the Centre as a Legal Fellow through the Clooney Foundation for Justice’s Waging Justice for Women programme. Her legal expertise lies in gender rights, and she has worked extensively on issues affecting women and marginalised communities, combining litigation, research, and advocacy to achieve transformative outcomes.

Tamika has played a leading role in several notable cases. These include the Embrace Project NPC and Others v Minister of Justice and Correctional Services and Others (04856/22) in the High Court, and its pending confirmation proceedings before the Constitutional Court of South Africa (CCT314/24 and CCT315/24), where the Centre—acting as amicus curiae alongside the Psychological Society of South Africa—advanced arguments on how peritraumatic responses to rape can impair a survivor’s ability to communicate, refuse, or withdraw consent, challenging the constitutional adequacy of South Africa’s current definition of rape.

She also contributed to the Centre’s interventions in Werner van Wyk and Others v Minister of Employment and Labour(CCT308/23) and Commission for Gender Equality and Another v Minister of Employment and Labour and Others(CCT309/23), which challenge the exclusionary and gendered nature of maternity and parental benefits under the Labour Relations Act.

At the regional level, Tamika has been involved in the case of Amhara Association of America and the Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria v. The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (Communication No. 814/23), currently before the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, addressing grave human rights violations committed during conflict in the Amhara region. She is also part of the legal team in Child Rights and Rehabilitation Network, Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa, and Centre for Human Rights (on behalf of children affected by witchcraft accusations in Nigeria) v. The Federal Republic of Nigeria (Communication No. 0017/COM/001/2021), a case currently before the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, which seeks to secure justice and protection for children subjected to abuse and discrimination linked to witchcraft accusations.

Tamika.Thumbiran@up.ac.za

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Published: 31 March 2020

Postdoctoral researcher
Programme Manager, LLM in International Trade and Investment Law in Africa (TILA)

  +27 (0)12 420 6200
  rj.kabre@up.ac.za

Podcast 

Dr Jonathan Kabre explains how his academic journey in the field of international relations led him to winning the 2020 Law Faculty Prize (Prix de Faculté) from the University of Lausanne for the best doctoral dissertation. His dissertation, through a comparative analysis of case-law of selected international courts and tribunals, examines the role of private lawyers (counsel and advocates) in the settlement of international disputes and their contribution to the development of international law. The monograph, coming from this dissertation, is in the editing process and should be out before the end of the year.

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Published: 13 February 2020

Ms Lydia Chibwe

Post-doctoral Research Fellow

Tel: +27 (0) 12 420 4306
lydia.chibwe@up.ac.za

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Published: 07 February 2020

LLM (UKZN), LLD (UP)

Project Officer& research assistant: Migrants' Rights Unit

+27 (0) 12 420 3151
  tundeenigbokan@gmail.com

Publications

• Making the right to vote of IDPs a reality: Lessons from Ethiopia Eds Enguday Meskele Ashine & Omotunde Enigbokan
• African countries need to ensure that the health of refugees is protected during the COVID-19 pandemic

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Published: 09 October 2019

Research Assistant, Disability Rights Unit

LLB (UNISA)

Tel  +27 (0)12 420 3072
Fax +27 (0)86 580 5743 
tariro.rufetu@up.ac.za

Mrs Tariro Rufetu is a Research Assistant in the Disability Rights Unit at the Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria. Tariro holds a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degree from University of South Africa (UNISA) Tariro is passionate about human rights and is working on developing her expertise in human rights in Africa through her work at the Centre for Human Rights.

Tariro has been actively involved in the work done by the Centre for Human Rights, most particularly, within the Disability Rights Unit. Tariro is currently part of a team working with the National Task Force for Persons with Albinism, who is drafting a national action plan on persons with albinism in South Africa. Tariro has been involved in access to justice for persons with disabilities trainings of justice personnel in South Africa and Botswana. She also does presentations on behalf of the Centre for Human Rights on issues related to disability rights in Africa.