Women Chief Justices

Nthomeng Majara is the first woman to become the Chief Justice of Lesotho. She was born in Lesotho on June 8, 1963. She was educated at the National University of Lesotho, from which she obtained a bachelor’s degree in law in 1992. She also holds a master’s degree in law (LL.M) from King’s College London, where she graduated in 1997.

Following her graduation, she became a lecturer at the National University of Lesotho from 1995 to 2000. Following her leave from the National University of Lesotho, she worked as a research associate at the Women and Law in Southern Africa Research and Educational Trust until 2003. Her next role was to be the Head of Internal Affairs at the Lesotho Revenue Authority. She only held the title for 4 months in 2004 until she became a Judge of the High Court at the Court of Appeals in Lesotho in 2004.

She was appointed Chief Justice for the Court of Appeals in 2014 and held the position until 2019. In addition to these positions, she chaired the Commission of Enquiry on the Adoption of Children in Lesotho and became a member of the council of state. She also briefly acted as a judge for the High Court of Namibia in 2010.

Justice Anastasia Msosa was born in a rural village in 1950 in Malawi. She went to Bunda College of Agriculture and from there applied to law school at Chancellor College after completing the admission requirement of two years of work experience at Chancellor. She earned a Bachelor of Law in 1975.

From there, Msosa worked on behalf of the state in both civil and criminal cases as a government lawyer. Msosa served as a legal advocate, principle legal advocate, and eventually a chief legal advocate in a span of 13 years. She then began to represent those who could not afford a lawyer in the Department of Legal Aid until 1990. She became Register General in 1990 and then became a judge in 1992.

After 1992, she was the first appointed female judge in the High Court. In 1997, she became the first female Justice of the Supreme Court of Appeals. Additionally, Msosa served as the chairperson of the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) from 1993 to 1997. During that time period, Malawi became a multiparty democracy. She was re- appointed to the MEC in 2005 and served another 2 terms until 2012. Following her MEC appointment, in a historical moment, Msosa became the first woman Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Malawi and served in the position from 2013 until 2015.

Abdoulaye Ly Kadidiatou Diori was appointed head of the Constitutional Court of Niger in 2013, which serves as the highest court in Niger. She is the second female President of the Constitutional Court following Fatimata Bazeye. Diori was born in 1952 in Niamey, Niger. She was originally educated in midwifery before she decided to study at the University of Niamey and receive a baccalaureate through night school. She then received a doctorate in public law from the University of Paris-Sud in 2005. In 2013, President Mahamadou Issoufou appointed Diori for another term as head of the Constitutional Court. Also in 2013, her peers on the Constitutional Court elected Diori President of the Constitutional Court, a position that she currently serves in.

Aloma Mariam Mukhtar was born in Lagos on November 20, 1944. She attended Gibson & Welder Law School and graduated in 1966 before being called to the English Bar in the same year.

She was called to the Nigerian Bar in 1967. She joined the Northern Nigerian Ministry of Justice as a Pupil State Counsel and Magistrate, becoming the first female magistrate in the North Eastern Government from 1969-1973. In 1973, she moved to Kano State to be the Chief Registrar of the State Judiciary, and five years later, she was appointed a judge of the High Court of Kano State.

Justice Mukhtar was nominated as the Justice for the Court of Appeals of Nigeria in 1987. She served in this position for 17 years, 12 years of which she served as President. In June 2005, she was promoted to the Supreme Court of Nigeria from the Court of Appeals. From there, in 2012, Honorable Justice Mukhtar was elevated to the Chief Justice position of Nigeria until 2014 when she reached the mandatory retirement age of 70. Additionally, she served as a Justice of the Supreme Court of The Gambia from 2011-2012, in an interim position.

Throughout her career, Honorable Justice Mukhtar was the first woman to be the attorney for Northern Nigeria, the first female Chief Registrar of Kano State Judiciary, the first female judge for the High Court in Kano State, and the first female jurist to be appointed to both the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court of Nigeria. She then became the first female Chief Justice for Nigeria. After leaving the Supreme Court of Nigeria, the Honorable Justice joined the National Council of State, the highest advisory body in Nigeria, as the first female permanent member.