September 2012


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The Vice Chancellor of The UWI has approved the appointment of Dr Kusha Haraksingh as the foundation Dean of the Faculty of Law at St. Augustine. He will act in this position for the period of one year. This follows the decision of the University Council to establish three full faculties of law in Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Barbados with effect from August 1, 2012.

Dr Haraksingh is a graduate of the prestigious School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London and is a Barrister of Lincoln’s Inn. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan, a visiting scholar at the University of Warwick, and a Senior Fulbright Fellow at Harvard University. At The UWI, Dr Haraksingh has taught a variety of multidisciplinary courses including Law and Society, Law and Business History, and Ethics and Jurisprudence in the Faculty of Medical Sciences. At the Graduate level, he has taught Spatial Information Law and Policy in the Faculty of Engineering, Advanced Caribbean Integration Law in the Faculty of Law, for more than 10 years has conducted the Globalization Seminar in the Institute of International Relations, and has produced several doctoral students.

Dr Haraksingh is an experienced university administrator who has been Chairman of the Institute of African and Asian Studies, Head of the Department of History, a member of the University Council and Senate, as well as Chair of a variety of University committees. He advises the University on Pensions law and chairs the University Standing Committee on Ordinances and Regulations.

In public life Dr Haraksingh has been a trade union leader as President of the West Indies Group of University Teachers, a Senator in the Parliament of Trinidad and Tobago, Chairman for many years of Caroni Limited, Chairman of the Central Regional Health Authority, and Chairman of the Sugar Association of the Caribbean. Dr Haraksingh is also a member of the Cariforum and Caricom College of Negotiators and the region’s Lead Negotiator for legal and institutional issues and for dispute settlement. He has been involved in a number of lobbying missions on behalf of the Caribbean, especially in Washington, Brussels and Geneva. Dr Haraksingh has been engaged as a consultant with several international organizations including UNCTAD, FAO, the Common Fund for Commodities, ILEAP [International Lawyers and Economists against Poverty], and the Commonwealth Secretariat.

In a series of successful arbitrations on behalf of West Indian cricketers Dr Haraksingh helped to establish their right to the ownership of their own intellectual property, paving the way for a revolution in their earning capacity.

For five years, Dr Haraksingh was a Caricom Arbitrator and Conciliator under the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas. He has been a Commissioner and founding Chairman of the Caricom Competition Commission since 2008, an appointment which he holds from the Regional Judicial and Legal Services Commission.