The Honourable Mr Justice Michael M. Ramodibedi

He was born on 24 April 1945 at Lesobeng, in the mountain areas of Lesotho — then part of Maseru District and today Thaba-Tseka. He often recalled how remote the district was in those years: he was ten years old the first time he saw a white man.

He was a boarder at Eagle's Peak High School in Qacha's Nek from 1963 to 1967 and was made Head Prefect in his final year. In 1968 he enrolled for the LLB at the University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland, completing Part 1 in 1970 and qualifying to continue at Edinburgh University — an opportunity the government of the day withheld from him on political grounds. He read BA Law instead, majoring in Law and Administration, before finally taking up Edinburgh in October 1971, where he graduated with distinction in Legislative Drafting.

He completed the LLB in April 1974 and was called to the Bar in August of the same year. Ten years as an advocate and twelve as an attorney followed: twenty-two years in private practice before he was elevated to the Bench of the High Court of Lesotho in 1996.

Public service ran alongside the judicial work. He chaired the Commission of Inquiry into the deaths at 'Muela in 1997, the Land Policy Review Commission in 1999–2000, and the Commission of Inquiry into the reconstruction of the Maseru city centre in 2003. He sat on the Council of State, which advises His Majesty the King, from December 1997 to 2004.

In April 2000 he was elevated to the Court of Appeal of Lesotho, and on 13 November 2002 he was sworn in as the first Mosotho permanent Judge of Appeal. From there his work crossed borders: President of the Court of Appeal of Seychelles from 2004, its first Resident President; Justice of Appeal in Botswana from 2006; Justice of Appeal and later Chief Justice of Swaziland; and President of the Court of Appeal of Lesotho from 2008 to 2014.

He made legal history as the first Mosotho from Lesotho not only to sit but to preside in the highest courts of Botswana, Lesotho, Seychelles and Swaziland. He was married to Mrs Jeannette 'Manapo Ramodibedi, with five children and five grandchildren.