Country Visits

The 48th Session of the Administrative Council of the African Regional Intellectual Property Organisation (ARIPO) was held in Lesotho from 28 October 2024 to 31 November 2024.

Adams & Adams Partner, Jameel Hamid, Associate Marile Fouche and Africa Practice Manager, Menzi Maboyi, attended the session.

Twenty-one member states were represented at this session with two observer states, Burundi and South Sudan.

The Registrar General of the Kingdom of Lesotho, Mrs. Mamoretlo Mohapi, provided welcome remarks and was followed by the Director General of ARIPO, Mr. Bemanya Twebaze, who addressed the Council. The DG highlighted the work of the Secretariat and “awareness creation and capacity-building initiatives that were geared towards the uptake of the ARIPO Protocols and enhancement of the Organization’s visibility in the Member States and forums gathering the users and potential users of ARIPO system.”

Towards the end of September 2024, Adams & Adams Partners, Simon Brown and Nicky Garnett and Africa Practice Manager, Menzi Maboyi, travelled to Cameroon to visit our Associate Office and to hold meetings with the OAPI Director General (DG), Mr Denis Bouhoussou and his team at the OAPI Headquarters in Yaounde..

This was an opportune time within which to travel and hold discussions with the OAPI Secretariat as a way of strengthening the close working relationship that we have with OAPI as one of the largest users of the system. Although Adams & Adams is based in South Africa we are able to work with OAPI via our OAPI office.

We visited our OAPI office and reviewed their operations, noting the increase in the size of the office which complements our objectives to continue to improve efficiencies and offer the best service to our clients. Our OAPI office continues to operate at a high level and is one of the flagship offices in the Adams & Adams Africa Network.

Adams & Adams Partner, Stephen Hollis, and Africa Practice Manager, Menzi Maboyi, travelled to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia from 23 – 26 June 2024 to visit our Associate Office and the Ethiopian Intellectual Property Authority (EIPA), where they were scheduled to meet with the Director General (DG) of the EIPA, Mr Woldu Yemessel Baraki, and the various departmental heads.

Mr Baraki assumed the position of DG in April 2023 after having served as Managing Director of a government media corporation, Fana Broadcasting Corporate, for more than a decade. Mr Baraki replaced Dr Ermias Yemanebirhan Hailemariam as DG who had held the position from November 2017.

On 18 April 2024, Menzi Maboyi and Amina Suliman travelled to eSwatini to engage with the Registrar of the IP Office, Dr Celucolo Dluldlu. During our visit, we were able meaningfully to engage on a number of aspects relating to capacity and operational constraints.