Professor Vincent O. Nmehielle, a legal and rule of law for development scholar and practitioner, is currently the Secretary-General of the African Development Bank Group in Abidjan, Cote D’Ivoire. Prior to joining the Bank Group, he oversaw Legal Affairs as the General Legal Counsel of the African Union at the African Union Commission in Addis Ababa. He was also Professor of Law and Head of the Wits Programme on Law, Justice, and Development in Africa at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) School of Law in Johannesburg, South Africa where he was on faculty from 2002 to 2017 and the first Bram Fischer Chair in Human Rights Law. Nmehielle was also a Professorial Lecturer in law at the Oxford University and The George Washington University Human Rights Program in 2003 and 2004. He served as the first African Principal Defender of the United Nations-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone in Freetown, Sierra Leone from 2005 to 2008. Professor Nmehielle is widely published and cited on constitutional issues, international law, human rights, international justice, and governance in Africa. He holds a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degree with Honors from the Rivers State University of Science and Technology, Port Harcourt, Nigeria; a Master of Laws (LL.M) degree, Summa Cum Laude in international law from the University of Notre Dame, USA; and a Doctor of Juridical Science (SJD) in international and comparative law from The George Washington University, Washington, D.C, USA.

Professor Nmehielle is married and bless with five children – a son and four daughters.