To the Hague from Nabinene

Daniel David Ntanda Nsereko served as Judge of the Appeals Chamber at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), in The Hague, Netherlands, from 2012 to 2023. Prior to joining the STL, Nsereko also served as Judge of the Appeals Division at the International Criminal Court (ICC), also in The Hague. Before his election to the ICC, he was Professor of Law at the University of Botswana where he served as Head of the Department of Law for eight years. He also taught law at Makerere University in Uganda and at the University of British Columbia in Canada as Owen Brown Visiting Professor of Law. At the time of his election as Judge of the ICC, he was a List Counsel, a lawyer admitted to represent accused persons and victims before the Court.

Whilst at the STL, Judge Nsereko was elected member of the Advisory Committee on Nominations of Judges, which vets candidates and advises States Parties to the Rome Statute on their suitability for election as judges of the ICC. He served on the Committee for six years. He is a distinguished scholar, particularly in the fields of international law, international criminal law and human rights. He is also an advocate and has practised law in Uganda.

This book is an autobiography in which Judge Nsereko narrates the story of his journey from Nabinene, his home village in rural Uganda, to The Hague, the legal capital of the world. It also gives an overview of his scholarly activities and professional experience. It is a fascinating story, replete with anecdotes, including those of life under successive despotic regimes since Uganda's independence. It is testimony to the value of good education and hard work, to the power of resilience and to the inestimable grace of God. It is also proof to the truth that it is not how you start but how you end that ultimately matters.