Augustine Sorie-Sengbe Marrah
Augustine Sorie-Sengbe Marrah is a leading lawyer and a pro-democracy activist in Sierra Leone. He graduated top of class from the Sierra Leone Law School in 2009 and has been in legal practice for more than fifteen years. He spent his first seven years of practice in one of Sierra Leone’s leading law firm—Yada Williams and Associates. He has offered ranging legal and consultancy services to the government of Sierra Leone as well as top corporate/commercial entities, and international human rights and charitable organisations and diplomatic institutions, such as the UNDP and EU Mission in Sierra Leone. Notable among his contributions to national policy formulation and governance building are his lead authorship of the proposed data protection law and regulation, proposed draft review of the civil registration law and regulations on vital statistics, national policy for non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the national policy on business and human rights.
He has litigated a few international commercial arbitrations before the London Court of International Arbitration and the International Chamber of Commerce Arbitration Court. He was co-counsel in an action brought by the association of Ebola survivors in Sierra Leone against the Republic of Sierra Leone at the ECOWAS Community Court of Justice. In the last decade, Augustine has been widely regarded as the foremost public impact litigator against bad governance actions or policies of the government of Sierra Leone. In April 2022, Augustine won a landmark action against the Inspector General of Police for unlawfully restricting vehicular movement during his country’s general elections. The outcome of this case has shaped electoral governance in Sierra Leone.
In 2019, Augustine was appointed by the President of Sierra Leone as one of a seven-member team to craft a national strategy to fight corruption in Sierra Leone. He was also a member of the Pharmacy Board of Sierra Leone—the body in charge of the pharmacy profession and pharmaceutical trade in Sierra Leone from 2018 to 2021 and served as chairman of its disciplinary committee during that period. He also served as secretary of the regulatory body for lawyers in Sierra Leone (General Legal Council) and its disciplinary committee for two consecutive years (2014-2016). He is the interim president of the Lawyers’ Society and a member of Sierra Leone Bar Association, the International Bar Association and the Commonwealth Lawyers Association. He manages his own law firm in Sierra Leone—Marrah & Associates.
Augustine has written extensively on ranging issues of good governance, rule of law, democracy and often blogs about political, social and economic injustices in Sierra Leone.