Justice Tujilane Chizumila is a Malawian lawyer and jurist who was appointed as a judge of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights in 2017 during the 28th Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the African Union. She has over 30 years of experience working in a legal, judicial, governing and democratic, and diplomatic capacity, on international programs, as well as in human rights and rule of law. She has served in Malawi, Zimbabwe, and Tanzania, in the Tanzania Legal Cooperation. Justice Chizumila has a Bachelor of Law degree from the University of Dar es Salaam and a Master’s degree in International Law. Chizumila worked for Save the Children for around a year before reporting to the Minister of Justice as a State Advocate. She was the first woman to establish a law firm in Malawi, and in 2000, she was the first female African Ambassador to be appointed High Commissioner to Zimbabwe.

In 2003, she was appointed judge of the High Court of Malawi. Justice Chizumila has served as Secretary of the Law Society of Malawi and was appointed Malawi’s first female Ombudsman by the Public Appointments Committee of the National Assembly. She served in this capacity from 2010 to 2015. Sticking to her reputation for ‘firsts’, she was also one of the first officers appointed by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) to address issues of displacement and child protection in Malawi. She was elected to the African Court in January 2017 and took up the seat in March of the same year.

Justice Chizumila is also a scholar who released the publication “A widow’s perspective- A personal experience”, which helped enact a law that made property grabbing illegal. Other publications include: “Women’s leadership roles and food security for refugees in Nsanje” and “Food distribution and sexual harassment in Ntcheu”.