Edwin Cameron

Edwin Cameron was first appointed as a judge in South Africa's legal system by President Nelson Mandela in 1994. He served 25 years as a judge, first on the High Court, then the Supreme Court of Appea, and finally on the Constitutional Court (South Africa’s highest court).

After retiring, he was elected Chancellor of Stellenbosch University and President Cyril Ramaphosa appointed him Inspecting Judge of prisons.  

A human rights lawyer under apartheid, Cameron helped secure the historic inclusion of sexual orientation in South Africa’s Constitution.

Cameron was an outspoken critic of then-President Mbeki’s AIDS-denialist policies.  He has written two prize-winning memoirs, Witness to AIDS (2005) and Justice: A Personal Account (2014), which have been translated into Chinese, German, Italian, and Korean.  He was the first, and remains the only, public officeholder in Africa to state publicly that he is living with HIV/AIDS.

His latest book, Behind Prison Walls: Unlocking a Safer South Africa (2025), is co-written with two of his law clerks.

South Africa’s highest civilian honour, the Order of the Baobab (Gold) was conferred on him in 2022.

In 2023, he was made a non-resident member of the Court of Appeal of Botswana.