Meet The Fellow

Meet Grace Ndera from Tanzania.

Grace is an Advocate of the High Court of Tanzania. Currently, Grace works in private practice, specifically in civil and criminal law and partly also in corporate law. It is Grace’s dream to live in a community that upholds social justice. For this reason, she joined the training programme so that she too can play her role in contributing to social justice reforms in her community. Grace shares a quote that she lives by “Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.” — J.F. Kennedy.

For the practicum, Grace is hosted at the Legal and Human Rights Centre (LHRC). During this period, Grace has had to learn a balancing act between her day to day tasks as a private practitioner, whilst also actively taking part in the practicum. She admits that this has been quite challenging at times. Luckily, with a supportive mentor and Grace’s strong will power she has learnt to tend to the many responsibilities that come with both her job and the practicum.

Grace’s project is on challenging Section 36(4)(e) of the Economic and Organised Crime Control Act, Cap 200 R.E. 2022. In Grace’s view, the said provision restricts the freedom to liberty and equality before the law for persons charged with an economic crime. The section provides that where the offense for which one is charged involves a property in excess of ten million Tanzanian shillings, then there must be payment of a cash deposit of half the value of the property, and the rest be secured by executing a bond, so as to be granted bail. Grace contends that the section impedes one’s fundamental right to bail and is discriminatory as it denies those charged with an economic crime the presumption of innocence. To challenge this, Grace intends to file a case seeking nullification of the section of the law for being unconstitutionally founded and denying rights to non-discrimination, liberty, equality before the law and the presumption of innocence as set out in Articles 12(1), 13(1), 13(6)(b) and 15(1) of the Constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania. For the bigger picture, Grace hopes that her contribution to the community will be influencing legal reforms in the criminal justice system.

“The sky is not the limit, there are footprints on the moon!” — Paul Brandt

We wish Grace the very best in her endeavours.