At Waweru Gatonye & Co, we take great pride in the professional development of our people in a bid to offer current and relevant services to our clients. It is for this reason that one of our senior associates (Tedd) attended the Human Rights and Access to Medicines course. The conference was organised by the Centre for Human Rights (University of Pretoria, South Africa) in conjunction with the Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property at the American University Washington College of Law and was being sponsored by the Open Society Institute and UNDP.

The knowledge acquired will doubtless be an asset to our Intellectual Property and consultancy capacity.

In summary, the Human Rights and Access to Medicines Course focused on the provision of information and skills-building exercises to enable civil society advocates to engage in legislation-drafting and constituent education to promote access to needed medicines in the region. Specifically, the course covered topics included but were not limited to:
* The economics of access to medicines in Africa;
* The impact of multinational and bilateral trade agreements on access to medicines;
* Key “flexibilities” in international intellectual property and trade law, including examination of the “Doha Agreement on TRIPS and Public Health”;
* The impact of “anti-counterfeit” legislation on access to needed to medicines, including examination of recent legislation in Kenya and multilateral forums;
* The use of competition laws to restrain patent monopolies and promote access to more affordable medicines, including recent cases from the South Africa Competition Commission;
* Mechanisms to negotiate and regulate the prices of medicines on national and regional levels, including proposals for regional purchasing pools.

This course was taught through participatory methodologies that emphasize exercises and role plays to better enable practical application of the course materials. Specific exercises and instruction focused on building useful advocacy skills including:
* Drafting legislation;
* Reviewing one’s country’s patent, competition and other legislation;
* Asking questions of ministers and other officials to research and monitor policy making;

The course was aimed at senior-level governmental and intergovernmental officials, leaders of civil society, law practitioners, staff and managers of NGO’s as well as academics and other interested parties. This course was particularly relevant for government officials in trade, health and competition ministries that deal with medicine pricing and intellectual property issues.

As the head of our Commercial, Securities and Real Estate Department, Mary takes a keen interest in emerging areas of Corporate finance. She attended this conference with the aim of getting the African perspective on Islamic finance and financial products. The conference focused on challenges and solutions and enlightened attendees on the importance of Shariah, theory of Islamic contracts and the use and application of a variety of Islamic financial products especially in Africa.

The speakers and panelists discussed in detail the regulatory and legal aspects, the potential of Islamic finance globally and in Africa, the concept of Islamic insurance, technology solutions in Islamic finance among many other interesting topics.

Key Speakers were from Central Bank of Kenya, Gatehouse Bank/UK, Path Solutions – Kuwait , King & Spalding LLP – Middle East, Pak Qatar Takaful Company, FNB & WesBank Islamic Finance – South Africa, Denton Wilde Sapte – Dubai, Gulf African Bank, with panelists from Shariah Supervisory Boards, Jaiz Bank – Nigeria, Bank of Uganda, Synergy Solicitors and Advocates – Uganda, First Community Bank – Kenya, Xtranet Communications – Kenya, leading Law firms both local and international and consumers of Islamic Finance products and services.