Tafaoimalo Tologata Justice Leilani Tuala-Warren, dean of the faculty of law at the University of Waikato, has been appointed as a judge of the Kiribati Court of Appeal for a three-year term.
Tafaoimalo will sit on the Court of Appeal, the highest court in Kiribati, alongside two fellow Judges.
Tafaoimalo says the appointment reflects the calibre of scholarship and teaching at Waikato, and the university’s commitment to developing legal thinkers who contribute meaningfully beyond Aotearoa New Zealand, particularly across the Pacific.
In 2024 she was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Law at Waikato University, becoming the first person of Pacific heritage in New Zealand to hold such a position.
Her work also includes the executive directorship of the Samoa Law Reform Commission. In 2013 she was a Family Court and Family Violence Court Judge in Samoa and was appointed a Justice of the Supreme Court of Samoa in 2016.
She is expected to have her formal swearing-in ceremony when she arrives in Kiribati for her three-year term. Her first hearing is scheduled for the end of June.
