06 December 2021

Dr Ndjodi Ndeunyema awarded inaugural Subedi Prize for Best Doctoral Dissertation 2019-20

The Law Faculty is delighted to announce the winner of the first annual Subedi Prize for best doctoral dissertation. The Subedi Prize was established in 2019 thanks to a generous donation from Professor Surya P. Subedi QC. The prize is awarded to the thesis that, in the opinion of the judges, makes the most exciting original contribution to the relevant field of scholarship and is best-crafted in terms of organisation, style and presentation.

The prize for the 2019-20 academic year is awarded to Dr Ndjodi Ndeunyema, for his thesis Interpreting Water: The Human Right to Water under the Namibian Constitution. This is an ambitious and highly original project, which offers a well-developed account of both the existence and justiciability of the human right to water in this context. The thesis delivers a powerful contribution as a whole, and succeeds in making a number of distinct self-standing contributions in various areas touched upon in the development of the analysis, even on topics with extensive prior literature.

On hearing he had won the prize, Ndjodi said:

I am truly thrilled and humbled that my DPhil thesis has been awarded the Inaugural Subedi Prize. I greatly appreciate the diligent guidance of my supervisor Prof Sandra Fredman and members of our research group over the years who made the research and writing journey a truly rich and fulfilling one.

Professor Mindy Chen-Wishart, Dean of the Faculty of Law, said:

We are absolutely delighted to award the inaugural Subedi Prize for the best DPhil thesis for 2019-20 to Dr Ndjodi Ndeunyema. As one of the largest PhD programmes in the world, we were faced with an embarrassment of riches in selecting a prize winner and we are grateful to Professor Subedi for funding the prize. Congratulations to Ndjodi and his supervisor Professor Sandy Fredman!

Ndjodi’s thesis has recently been published as a book by the Pretoria University Law Press.