SOUTH African academic Prof Christina Murray has been named as the second international member of the five-member Constitutional Commission.
She was named by Prime Minister Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama yesterday.
Prof Murray is a Professor of Constitutional and Human Rights Law at the University of Cape Town.
A Fiji government statement confirmed this saying she was on leave as the Jennings Randolf Senior Fellow at the United States Institute for Peace in Washington DC.
Prof Murray has taught and written on a number of areas of the law, including human rights law ù particularly relating to gender equality, violence against women, and constitutional rights for women, international law, and constitutional law.
Between 1994 and 1996 Prof Murray served on a panel of seven experts advising the South African Constitutional Assembly in drafting South Africa's "final" Constitution.
She most recently ser¡ved on the Kenyan Committee of Experts appointed by the Kenyan Parliament to draft a new Constitution of Kenya-approved and promulgated in August 2010.
Prof Murray has also taken part in constitutional work in the countries of Southern Sudan, Nepal, Zimbabwe and Pakistan. She joins commission chairperson Prof Yash Ghai and Taufa Vakatale, the first female deputy prime minister of Fiji, and academic Dr Satendra Nandan on the commission.
Her appointment leaves one more place to be filled by a local.