South African High Court Justice Albie Sachs is scheduled to speak at the UW School of Law Monday.

Over his long and distinguished career, Sachs has earned international prominence as an outspoken advocate for human rights and an important activist for ending apartheid and creating a constitutional democracy in South Africa.

He holds the highest court position on constitutional matters in South Africa.

As a law student, Sachs was involved in the Defiance of Unjust Laws Campaign in Cape Town. After he passed the bar, he used his position as an attorney to defend South African citizens during the height of apartheid.

Because of his activism, Sachs became a target of the South African government; he was subjected to several raids by police and served multiple terms of imprisonment, until finally he immigrated to Mozambique in 1966.

Even in exile, Sachs remained an activist. He worked alongside African National Congress (ANC) leader Oliver Tambo to draft the ANC's Code of Conduct.

His continued opposition to apartheid in South Africa kept him on the government's radar, and, in 1988, Sachs was the victim of a government-rigged car bomb that caused him to lose his right arm and sight in one eye.

Not deterred, Sachs worked during the following years to prepare a new constitution for South Africa.

In 1990, as the repressive apartheid regime was crumbling, he returned to his country as a national executive of the ANC and a member of the Constitutional Committee.

There, he became an integral part of the negotiations that reformed the government of South Africa as a constitutional democracy. In 1994, he was appointed to his current position on the High Court by Nelson Mandela.

Sylvia Wairimu Kang'ara is an assistant professor of law at the UW who is also on the Lectureship Committee instrumental in bringing Sachs to campus.

"He is an example of how one can fight for justice until freedom is achieved," Kang'ara said. "South Africa has emerged as a leader ... concerned with individual rights and human dignity, due in large part to jurisprudence. It has become a shining beacon, not just for the African continent, but for all others as well."

Reach reporter Siv Prince at news@thedaily.washington.edu