Lawyer Monthly - Women In Law Special Edition

WOMEN IN LAW EDITION LAWYER MONTHLY 111 What was your motivation for specialising in human rights law? When I started working on immigration law, I enjoyed helping the corporate clients that needed assistance during investment opportunities or wanted to apply for schemes to allow foreign workers to join their companies. But, alongside this, I also had many clients suffering, as a result of discrimination. This included students that could no longer return to countries that were under on- going conflict. The failure of the states offering protection and actually victimising people due to their tribe, politics, gender or social group had taken me aback and when I witnessed someone’s human rights being breached, it would light a fire in my stomach. I was thus driven to gaining the client’s perspective and applying for the best level of protection for them. What were the aspects which took you by most surprise when first delving into human rights? I was surprised at how little we respect each other’s rights and, in general, the lack of basic respect for human life. An example is a refugee: they leave their country looking for protection but despite their obvious need for help, they still need to fight to be heard, fight for access to legal services and even to get basic subsistence. I find this extremely sad. The similarities in problems and causational factors from country to country was also enlightening. As human beings, we have more things in common than aspects that differentiates us, yet we do not value and respect each other. What has been your most challenging case yet? And how did you overcome the challenges? Each case has its own challenges. We work on commercial cases and one important victory I had was against a bank that failed to take sufficient action to prevent a fraud against my client’s account. Initially, they stated our client was liable for all expenditure, but we were able to show serious negligence by the bank, so we were not liable and secured our cost. We have also been successful in actions against police for excessive force, thousands of cases for delay in settlement and entry visa refusal. But I had a unique case where a British man was refused entry to the United Kingdom as he was wrongly accused of identity fraud. We won that case despite barriers being put against us. Honing in emotion to fight against highly sensitive and emotive cases, such as female genital mutilation (FGM), I imagine can be difficult. How do you build up to work on these cases, ensuring you are at your best ability during on tough cases such as these? Many of the areas I deal with are highly charged. Some have to do with culture, religion, or children and are extremely sensitive. I am human first and so I try to assimilate the information and I do find myself constantly thinking about my cases because I am passionate about my work and doing the right thing by my client. I do have many years of experience, so now I find that things which might shock others, somewhat do not surprise me much anymore. I’d rather analyse disturbing situations and have Q Q Q Q