Kenya officially nominated lawyer Prof Phoebe Okowa for election as a judge to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), during the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council in 2026.
Kenya, through its Permanent Mission to the United Nations, communicated its decision in a diplomatic note addressed to the Permanent Mission of Djibouti to the U.N., dated February 27.
“Kenya presents its compliments to the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Djibouti to the United Nations, in its capacity as Coordinator of the Eastern African Sub-region on Candidatures, and has the honour to inform of the nomination of Professor Phoebe Okowa by the Kenya National Group to the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) for election as a lodge of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) during the elections to be held at the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly and the Security Council in 2026,” the note reads.
Kenya emphasized on Prof Okowa’s competence and qualifications for the role while requesting Djibouti, as Coordinator of the Eastern African Sub-region on Candidatures, to circulate Okowa’s nomination to other African nations for support.
“The Government of the Republic of Kenya is convinced that Professor Okowa is competent and well qualified to contribute to the work of the ICJ,” the note reads.
“The Permanent Mission of the Republic of Kenya requests the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Djibouti to circulate this note to the Member States of the African Group for their valuable support.”
Okowa is a Professor of Public International Law and Director of Graduate Studies at Queen Mary University of London.
She previously taught Public International law, Constitutional Law and Private International Law as a member of the Faculty of Law at the University of Bristol. She has held visiting appointments at the Universities of Lille, Helsinki Stockholm and WZB Berlin Social Science Center for Global Constitutionalism and has lectured for the United Nations at its Regional Course on International Law for Africa.
An advocate of the High Court of Kenya, she has acted as counsel and consultant to governments and non-governmental organisations on questions of international law before domestic and international courts including the International Court of Justice.
In 2017 she was nominated as an arbiter to the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague.
Okowa graduated at the top of her class with a Bachelor of Law (LLB) with First Class Honours from the University of Nairobi, Kenya.
She proceeded to the University of Oxford on a Foreign and Commonwealth Office Scholarship, obtaining the degree of Bachelor of Civil Law. She later completed her doctoral thesis at Oxford.
Her work on the Admissibility of claims in International Adjudication has been cited with approval numerous times by domestic Courts considering questions of International Law.
She is on the International Advisory Board of the Stockholm Centre for International Law and the Executive Committee of the International Society of Public Law (ICON-S).
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