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Palesa Madi appointed Deputy Director at CALS

- Lee-Anne Bruce

CALS is very pleased to announce that Ms Palesa Madi has officially been appointed as Deputy Director of our organisation

We are proud to report that Palesa Madi was today appointed as Deputy Director of CALS by a panel of interviewers in the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management at Wits University. We are confident that she will continue to lead our organisation with her trademark dedication, skill and passion.

Palesa has worked at CALS since 2013, when she completed a year-long graduate internship with us. Since then, she has been appointed as a candidate attorney, retained as an attorney and then promoted to head of what was then known as the Rule of Law programme before taking on the role of acting Deputy Director. Her practice has involved cases ranging from supporting the women of Marikana to exercise their right to protest, to promoting the rights of people in detention, to challenging apartheid era legislation like the Intimidation Act.

Over the last year alone, Palesa was named one of the Mail & Guardian’s 200 Young South Africans, featured in a web series on ‘Women in Social Justice’ and completed an LLM through Wits University with a thesis entitled ‘Transformation in the public interest legal sector and transformative constitutionalism’. She continues to sit on the Board of Gun Free SA and the Steering Committee of the Right2Protest Project.

“Palesa was a member of the transition team that welcomed me with open arms, ensuring a smooth and steady transition,” says CALS Director, Prof Tshepo Madlingozi. “She performs her demanding role with compassion, fairness, diligence and exceptional professionalism. Moreover, Palesa is an exciting emerging scholar researching in the area of holistic transformation of the social justice sector. Client communities, donors and partner organisations hold her in high esteem as she promotes an atmosphere of collaboration and solidarity in all our work and in our larger civil society networks.”

We welcome her permanent appointment as Deputy Director and look forward to continuing our work together.

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