Room 5.34 - Kramer Law Building

Dr Nomfundo Ramalekana is a senior lecturer in the Public Law Department at UCT’s Law Faculty. She completed her LLB at the University of Pretoria in 2014. She then worked at Bowmans Law (Johannesburg office) and moved to the United Kingdom to pursue a Bachelor of Civil Laws in 2016 and an MPhil (Law) in 2017 at Oxford University and a DPhil/PhD (Law) 2021.  While at Oxford, Nomfundo worked as a Graduate Teaching Assistant for the comparative human rights law and comparative equality law courses on the Bachelor of Civil Law. She was also a Research Assistant for the Africa Oxford Initiative and a blog editor for the Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog.

Research Interests

Nomfundo’s areas of interest are constitutional law, human rights law, anti-discrimination law, feminist legal theory and critical race theory.

Teaching

Constitutional Law, Women & Law (final year elective)

Edited Books

• Jason Brickhill, Adila Hassim, Michael Bishop & Nomfundo Ramalekana (eds) 'South African Constitutional Law' (Juta 2023).

Peer-Reviewed Journals Articles

• N Ramalekana & P de Vos, ‘Erasure, Xenophobic Discrimination and Non-Citizens’ Rights to Equality and Work in South Africa: A Commentary on Rafoneke v Minister of Justice’ (Constitutional Court Review-Journal, 2025)
• N Ramalekana & J Mavedzenge, ‘Courts as a Forum for Safeguarding the Right of Opposition Parties to Participate in Democratic Processes: A Comparative Analysis of South Africa and Zimbabwe’ World Comparative Law Journal, 2025
• N Ramalekana & L Mokgoroane ‘Intersectionality in the South African Constitution’s Equality Clause’ South African Journal on Human Rights, 2024
• N Ramalekana ‘A Critique of the Stigma Argument Against Affirmative Action in South Africa’ [2022] University of Oxford Human Rights Hub
• Nomfundo Ramalekana, ‘What’s So Wrong with Quotas? An Argument for the Permissibility of Quotas under s 9(2) of the South African Constitution’ [2020] Constitutional Court Review 252.

Book Chapters

• N Ramalekana, South Africa’s transformative constitution as 'non-reformist reform'' in The Making (and Re-Making) of Public Law, Eoin Carolan, Jason Varuhas, Sarah Fulham-Mcquillan (eds) (Hart Publishing, 2025)
• N Ramalekana ‘The (mis)appropriation of human rights, norm-spoiling and white supremacist backlash in South African minority rights litigation’ in N Ally & L Boonzaier (eds) Edwin Cameron: Influences and Impact (PULP 2025).
• N Ramalekana, ‘The Uses of Ubuntu under the South African Constitution’ in The Language of Comparative Constitutional Law: Questioning Hegemonies Erika Arban et al. (eds) (Forthcoming, Hart Publishing, 2025).
• Nomfundo Ramalekana (with Victoria Myandazi and Larona Somolekae), ‘An Equality-Sensitive Approach to Redressing the Disproportionate Socio-Economic Impact of Covid-19 on Vulnerable Groups in Botswana, Kenya, and South Africa’ in Justice Mavedzenge (ed), COVID-19 Pandemic and Socio-Economic Rights in Selected East and Southern African Countries (Juta 2020).

Commissioned Research

• Nomfundo Ramalekana, “Key Trends in The Protection and Enforcement of Anti-Discrimination Law in Southern Africa” Research completed for the UN Human Rights Office of the High Commission (Regional Office for Southern Africa), January 2025, with research assistance from Sheryl Kunaka, PhD Candidate, University of Cape Town.

Current Research Projects

• Nomfundo Ramalekana, Affirmative Action in Post-Apartheid South Africa, (Hart Publishing, Forthcoming 2026-27).
• Cathi Albertyn, Victoria Miyandazi & Nomfundo Ramalekana (eds) Equality Law Jurisprudence in Africa (Work in Progress, Expected 2026-27).

Digital Scholarship

• W Zondo & N Ramalekana, Namibian High Court Decriminalises the ‘Crime of Sodomy’ and ‘Unnatural Sexual Offences’: A Beacon of Hope for LGBTQIA+ Rights in Africa (African Law Matters Blog, 5 July 2024)
• N Ramalekana, ‘(Un)Learning from the US Supreme Court’s Affirmative Action Judgement: A South African Perspective’ (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, 11 July 2023)
• N Ramalekana ‘‘White Backlash’ Against Affirmative Action in the United States and South African Courts’ (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, 11 Feb 2022)
• N Ramalekana & S Fredman ‘Government SME relief package unfairly discriminates against non-citizens’ Daily Maverick, (April 2020)
• N Ramalekana, ‘A duty to implement affirmative action/reservations for India and South Africa?’ (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, February 2020)
• N Ramalekana ‘Affirmative Action in South Africa: The Urgency of Accounting for Historically Entrenched White Privilege and Power’ (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, 13 July 2018)
• N Ramalekana, ‘Balancing the Scales in Eviction Cases in South Africa: A Note on Occupiers of erven 87 & 88 Berea v Christiaan Frederick De Wet’ (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, 28 June 2017)
• N Ramalekana, ‘Human Dignity, Land Dispossession, And the Right To Security Of Tenure: A Note On The South African Constitutional Court’s Judgement In Daniels v Scribante’ (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, 26 May 2017)