Bienvenue à Constanze Semelmann et à l’honorable Anthony Fernando

Constanze SemmelmannAnthony Fernando

La Faculté de droit est ravie d’accueillir Constanze Semmelmann à titre de Boursière Wainwright. Elle arrive de l’Université de Saint-Gall, en Suisse, où elle enseigne le droit européen. Durant son année à McGill, madame Semmelmann enseignera le droit comparé de la concurrence, ainsi qu’un cours interdisciplinaire et un cours avancé en droit européen. Elle fera également des travaux de recherche postdoctorale. « Mon but est d’avoir complété une première version de ma deuxième thèse, ‘The Role of Comparative Law in European Union Law’, confie-t-elle. « Je prends en exemple l’évaluation du principe de l’abus de droit dans mon analyse. »

Pour madame Semmelmann, il existe un lien clair entre sa recherche et la mission du Fonds Wainwright, qui a été créé pour promouvoir la recherche et l’avancement du droit civil à l’Université McGill. « Je suis en train de faire l’analyse d’un principe qui a ses origines dans le droit civil français et dans d’autres systèmes connexes, et qui n’a pas d’équivalent en common law. Le droit européen a besoin de trouver un dénominateur commun quand de tels clivages juridiques se présentent. »

The Faculty also extends a warm welcome to Justice Anthony Francis Tissa Fernando, who arrived in January for a three-month stay as our new O’Brien Fellow in Residence at the Centre for Human Rights and Legal Pluralism. During his time at the Faculty, he will be providing McGill law students with the benefit of his real-life experience in issues pertaining to the separation of powers, the rule of law, judicial independence and combating corruption in Sri Lanka and the Seychelles.

Justice Fernando comes to McGill from the Court of Appeal, the apex court of the Republic of Seychelles where, prior to his appointment to the bench in January 2009, he served as Attorney General for ten years. He also lectures in Criminal Law at the University of Seychelles and, for the University’s Young Leaders Programme, on the Human Rights Charter in the Seychelles Constitution. A Sri Lankan by birth, he was formerly a State Counsel in the Attorney General’s Department of Sri Lanka, where he also lectured in Constitutional and Public Law, the Law of Contracts and Mercantile Law at the Open University of Sri Lanka, as well as in Criminal Law at the Sri Lanka Law College.

“Whilst the Civil law of Sri Lanka is based on a Roman-Dutch tradition,” he says, in the Seychelles, “our civil law hails from the Napoleonic code, but our Criminal law, commercial law and administrative law are from the English tradition.” As in any jurisdiction, mixed or not, he says, “In the end, the quest is for justice.”

As an Executive Committee Member of the International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities, Justice Fernando has spoken on the subject of international cooperation in this area. “One area I’d like to focus on while I’m here is the conflict between fighting corruption and protecting property rights and privacy rights,” he says.

– Textes de Bridget Wayland
– Photos de Lysanne Larose

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