Namibian lawyer elected Vice President of international law society body

The Director of the Law Society of Namibia, Mrs Retha Steinmann is the new Vice President of the International Institute of Law Association Chief Executives (IILACE).

IILACE (pronounced “eye-lace”) is an association of Chief Executive Officers of the Law Societies and Bar Associations from around the world. Mrs Steinmann is the only African serving on the Executive Committee.

The association’s bylaws stipulate that when the Vice President is elected, this person becomes the next President after completion of the two-year term. Mrs Steinmann is therefore the designate President of IILACE, to be announced in October 2018.

At the association’s Annual General Meeting held in Wellington, New Zealand at the end of October 2016, Mrs Steinmann who was previously the Secretary/Treasurer for the association’s Executive Committee, was chosen as Vice President for a two-year term. She was elected to the Executive Committee for the first time in 2008 when the Law Society of Namibia hosted the IILACE conference in Windhoek.

The Annual General Meeting of IILACE is the platform where all CEOs of law societies and bar associations meet once a year. This year’s meeting discussed, amongst others, the profession’s core values, delivery of legal services to customers, transition in the legal profession worldwide, diversity, innovation, the role of a law society as regulator, and navigating the future.

IILACE is the forum for law society CEOs to exchange views and information of common interest to lawyers at local, regional and international level. It promotes and defends the status and interests of the legal profession, law associations and the rule of law. The association was inaugurated in July 1999 in Edinburgh, Scotland.