Sope Willams Elegbe

Sope is a consultant for different governments, the World Bank and is currently on the anti-corruption sub-committee of the International Bar Association in charge of exclusion and debarment In December 2022, she was awarded the prestigious Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al-Thani International Excellence Award for Anti-Corruption Research and Education in recognition of her research, education and training on anti-corruption law. https://aceaward.com/en/news/details/89

Sope is the Vice-Chair of the Debarment and Exclusion sub-committee of the International Bar Association and a member of Transparency International’s Working Group on Debarment and Exclusion. She is also a Fellow at the Public Procurement Research Group, University of Nottingham since 2020, and an advisor international institutions and government bodies on procurement and anti-corruption matters who trains the public and the private sector in ethics and anti-corruption law.

In 2019, the South African National Research Foundation rated her to be an “Internationally recognised researcher" with a B2 rating. The Open Contracting Partnership selected her as an anti-corruption champion in 2021. She has been an invited and keynote speaker at over 100 conferences in over 30 countries.

On February 15, 2016, she trained Nigerian Lawmakers in the House of Assembly on Nigerian public procurement law. Her training highlighted that Nigeria has been defrauded because of the loopholes in the public procurement act and the failure of agencies to enforce the law. Sope Williams, said that a solution was to engage legislative, institutional and organisational changes in public procurement reforms. From 2016-2029 she trained over 300 investigators from the South African Office of the Public Protector in investigating public procurement corruption.

Sope was the Head of Research at the Nigerian Economic Summit Group, Lagos from 2014 till 2016.[1] In 2016, she moved to South Africa and was appointed a professor of law at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. From 2018 to 2021, she was the Head of the department of Mercantile law, and is currently the Deputy Director of the African Procurement Law Unit. She is also on the Board of the international NGO- SlaveFree Trade and counter-corruption institute- the Pavocat-Stellenbosch Academy.

Sope Williams started her career at the University of Stirling, Scotland, as a lecturer in business law in 2000. In 2003, moved to the University of Nottingham and joined the School of Law. In 2008 she was co-opted to work on a project on the World Bank’s expert group that helped the Bank reform its procurement process which lasted till 2011. She obtained a PhD in public procurement and anti-corruption law in 2011 from the University of Nottingham.

She was born in Geneva, to Chief and Mrs F.O Williams. She attended Geneva English School and later Home Science Primary School, Ikoyi, for her early education. She went on to Queen’s College, Yaba, and the University of Lagos. She was called to the Nigerian Bar in 1999 after which she went to the London School of Economics where she obtained an LLM with distinction in 2000.

Sope Williams (born 9 August 1975) is a Nigerian professor of Law, public procurement scholar and anti-corruption champion.