Rumbidzai Dube is a pan-African feminist lawyer, born and raised in Zimbabwe. She has over a decade of professional experience in the fields of gender and women’s rights, democracy and governance, and human rights.

Rumbidzai holds a Bachelor of Laws (Honours) Degree (LLB) from the University of Zimbabwe,  a Master of Laws Degree (LLM) in International Law specialising in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa from the University of Pretoria, and a Master of Philosophy Degree (MPhil) (with distinction) in African Studies from the University of Cambridge. She is currently studying for a PhD in Politics and International Studies at the University of Cambridge.

Rumbidzai’s women’s rights work began as a law undergraduate in Zimbabwe, where she volunteered for research projects at the Southern and Eastern African Regional Centre for Women’s Law (SEARWCL) and provided legal assistance to underserved women at the Zimbabwe Women Lawyers Association (ZWLA). She later joined the Research and Advocacy Unit (RAU) as a Researcher supporting women’s political participation, documenting cases of politically motivated violence against women human rights defenders, activists and politicians,  developing dossiers for criminal prosecution of perpetrators and steering advocacy efforts for redress. She personally engaged the Office of the President and Cabinet in Zimbabwe to strengthen anti-trafficking initiatives including the promulgation of anti-trafficking legislation. After leaving RAU she served as a UN Women Senior Advisor and as the National Advisor for GIZ, support key Zimbabwean institutions such as the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission, the Zimbabwe Gender Commission, the Parliament of Zimbabwe, the Ministry of Women Affairs, the Ministry of Justice and CSOs to strengthen women’s human rights and anti-GBV preventative and responsive structures.

Her Pan-African work includes human rights research and advocacy for the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies(CIHRS) at the height of the Arab Spring and Legal Expert work at the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights(ACHPR) where she drafted legal decisions, opinions and briefs building the ACHPR’s human rights jurisprudence. As a Senior Programmes Officer at the African Child Policy Forum(ACPF) she supported the work of the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACERWC) through developing general comments to provide guidance to African States on implementing their obligations under the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, and supported the East African Community (EAC)’s efforts to harmonise national child laws with regional and international instruments on children’s rights.

Rumbidzai has supported ISLA’s work since 2016, serving as faculty for ISLA’s Litigation Institutes, training lawyers from across the continent on litigating women’s rights using regional human rights mechanisms such as the ACHPR, and  lending her legal expertise.

Rumbidzai loves travelling, trying out different cuisine and absorbing different cultures. When she is not travelling she enjoys gardening, interior design, reading novels, listening to music and watching films from across the globe, K-dramas being her most recent favourite.