Dr Charles Khamala, PhD, Advocate

Position: Dean, Faculty of Law

Department: Faculty of Law

Email: deanlaw@cuea.edu

Dr. Charles A. Khamala is a Senior Lecturer in law with over fifteen years’ experience. He holds a Ph.D. in Law from the Université de Pau et des Pays de l’Adour (France, 2015), LL.M. (London, 2006), LL.B. (Nairobi, 1990) and Postgraduate Diploma in Law (1992). Following pupillage under Pheroze Nowrojee advocate, Dr. Khamala has practiced as an advocate of the High Court of Kenya for over 30 years and is Listed Counsel of the International Criminal Court is a member of the Association of Defence Counsel Practicing before International Courts and Tribunals, and serves on both the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights’ and UN’s Ombudsperson to the ISIL (Da’esh) and Al-Qaida, Legal Aid Schemes among others. He was a Fondation Maison des Sciences de l’Homme Themis Laureate (2023), joint Platform Magazine’s C.B. Madan awardee (2020), and has held positions at the Law Faculties of KU Leuven (Visiting Scholar, 2018) and Rhodes University (Andrew W. Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellow, 2016). Besides serving the Criminal Justice Committees of the East African Law Society and Law Society of Kenya for several years, Dr. Khamala is Kenya’s Director General on the International Forum on Crime and Criminal Law in the Global Era (since 2018). He is a member of numerous other formidable organisations, including the International Commission of Jurists (K), the African Network of Constitutional Lawyers, the International Society of Criminology, the World Society of Victimology, and sits on numerous Editorial Boards of journals in Africa (including the LSK Journal), Asia and the US. Besides his doctorate Crimes against Humanity in Kenya’s Post-2007 Conflicts Wolf Legal Publishers (2018), Dr. Khamala has published over 25 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters on international criminal law, criminal law and procedure, constitutional law and human rights, appearing in the African Human Rights Yearbook, African Yearbook on International Humanitarian Law, African Human Rights Law Journal and the Law and Development Review. He also supervises doctoral and masters’ theses. Charles emerged among the top three in the Teacher of the Year 2024 at the Nairobi Legal Awards.

1. Khamala, Charles Alenga, Crimes Against Humanity in Kenya’s Post-2007 Conflicts: A Jurisprudential Interpretation (The Netherlands: Wolf Legal Publishers, 2018).

1. Khamala, Charles A., “Ghost of the Malabo Protocol: Political Conditions Influencing African Countries’ Refusals to Extradite International Criminal Court Suspects” (2025) 25 African Human Rights Law Journal, South Africa, 141-172.

2. Khamala, Charles A., “Digital Surveillance and Big Data: Balancing the Rights to Privacy and Security in Kenya” (2024) The African Journal of Privacy & Data Protection, South Africa, 1, 176-206.

3. Khamala, Charles A., “Beyond Criminal or Civil Asset Forfeiture in Kenya” (2023) Criminology and Criminal Law Review, USA, 6, 2, 6-19.

4. Khamala, Charles A., and Kinuya Wanjohi, “‘Domestic Terrorism’ and Victim Precipitation of Battered Men Syndrome during Kenya’s Covid-19 Curfew” (2023) Mount Kenya University Law Journal, Kenya, 3, 1-32.

5. Khamala, Charles A., “Some Realism about Wounding Words: Comparing Nigeria’s Death Penalty for Blasphemy with East African Sentencing Jurisprudence” (2023) Law Society of Kenya Journal, Kenya, 18, 2, 67-90.

6. Khamala, Charles A., and Likaka Luchetu, “Beyond Customary Justice: Exploring Non-State Actors’ Roles in Kenya’s Counter-Radicalisation Programmes” (March 2022) UPSA African International & Comparative Law Journal, Ghana, 3, 38-86.

7. Khamala, C.A., “Green Crimes: The Impact of Genetically Modified Organisms on Promoting Food Security in Kenya” (2022) African Human Rights Yearbook, South Africa, Vol. 6, 291-320.

8. Khamala, Charles A., “Legal Aid for Effective Victim Legal Representation in Kenya’s Post-Election Violence: Lessons from the International Criminal Court” (2022) International Journal of Criminology and Sociology, Canada, 11, 159-171.

9. Khamala, Charles A., “External and Internal Common Victim Legal Representation at the International Criminal Court: Beyond the ‘Kenya Trial Approach’” (2020) African Yearbook on International Humanitarian Law, South Africa, 159-191.

10. Khamala, Charles A., “When Rescuers become Refoulers: Closing Kenya’s Refugee Camps amid Terrorism Threats and Leaving Vulnerable Groups out in the Cold” (2020) Africa Nazarene University Law Journal, South Africa, Vol. 8, Issue 1, 1-29.

11. Khamala, C.A., “Oversight of Kenya’s Counter Terrorism Measures on Al-Shabaab” (Jun 2019) Law and Development Review, Germany, Volume 12, Issue 1, 79-118.

12. Khamala, Charles A., “Genocide Denial and Freedom of Political Expression in the Ingabire Case” (2018) African Human Rights Yearbook, South Africa, 2, 454-486.

13. Juma, L. and C.A. Khamala, “A Dynamic Approach to Assess the International Criminal Court’s Performance in the Kenya cases” (2017) Lesotho Law Journal, Lesotho, Vol. 25 no. 2, 39-73.

14. Khamala, Charles A., “Protecting Africa’s Property from Foreign Corrupt Investment,” August 2015, Law Society of Kenya Journal, Kenya, Vol. 11 (1), 55-89.

15. Khamala, Charles A., “Legal Aid and Actuarial Justice in Kenya” Law Society of Kenya Journal, Kenya, vol. 9 (1) March 2013, 117-153.

16. Khamala, Charles A., “Incremental Judicial Reforms in Kenya” in the Oxford Journal of Transitional Justice Research: Debating International Justice in Africa Essays collected from 2009-2010, (June 2010) The Foundation for Law, Justice and Society in collaboration with the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies University of Oxford, U.K., 111-114.

17. Khamala, Charles A., “U.S.-Driven TRIPS or UNESCO’s Cultural Conventions: Regulating the Impact of Global Film in Kenya” [2008-10] 1 Kenya Law Review, Kenya, 325-385.

18. Khamala, Charles A., “Educating Diana: Cultural Liberation for Self Determination” [2007] 1 Kenya Law Review, Kenya, 120-150.

1. “Deliberative Democracy Without Public Participation in Kenya’s Elusive Search for Electoral Justice” in Ogechi E. Anyanwu, Lisa Day, Daniel Joseph, Iddah A. Otieno & Joshua D. Farrington (eds.) Ancient and Modern: The African Experience (Eastern Kentucky University Libraries 2025) 489-536.

2. Khamala, Charles A., “Overcriminalization by Containment without Covid: Inside Kenya’s Refugee Camps” in Chirag Balyan & Garima Pal (eds.) Criminalization: Politics and Policies (Studies in Critical Social Sciences, 293) (The Netherlands: Brill, 2025) 195-222.

3. Khamala, Charles A., “Post-Covid Prosecution of Crimes against Humanity in Kenya’s Mau Forest Ecosystem” in Nashon Adero and Josephat Juma (eds.) The Future of Africa in the Post-COVID-19 World (Nairobi: IREN, 2021) 159-176.

4. Khamala, Charles A., “Victims and Witnesses Protection in the Ruto and Sang case: Implication on Secondary Victimization” in Francis Nyawo & Joseph Wasonga (eds.) International Criminal Justice in Africa Since the Rome Statute (Nairobi: LawAfrica 2019) 107-133.

5. Khamala, C.A., “Whither Communities? Restorative Justice in the Tiomin Kenya Titanium Mining Case” in Jürgen Runge & James Shikwati (eds.) Geological Resources and Good Governance in Sub-Saharan Africa: Holistic Approaches to Management and Sustainable Development (London, Taylor & Francis Publishers (UK), 2011) 101-129.

6. Khamala, Charles A., “Why Corruption Works: Kenyan Myth Debunked” Tom Ojienda (ed.) Anti -Corruption and Good Governance in East Africa (Nairobi. LawAfrica, 2008) Chapter 2.

7. Khamala, Charles A., “The Criminalization of Culture: Deconstructing Psychological and Legal Language in Kenya” Ruth Bett, Elisabeth Mueller and Cay Etzold (eds.) Across Borders: Benefiting from Cultural Differences (DAAD/Goethe/University of Nairobi, 2005) 250-264.