Kaamilah Paulse is an attorney and the director of the family and matrimonial department at Herold Gie Attorneys. For the past 20 years, she has practised exclusively in the field of family and matrimonial law and related client matters, with a special interest in Muslim family law.
Kaamilah’s job is to handle a range of legal issues that includes divorces, financial dissolution disputes, universal partnerships, parenting disputes, maintenance disputes, antenuptial contracts, postnuptial contracts, cohabitation agreements and Muslim marriage contracts.
She was working for a big corporate law firm and advocating for justice in various areas, but became drawn to family law when she realised the inequity that arises from the person controlling the finances during divorce and related proceedings, often to the detriment of women and children.
Kaamilah has had hundreds of cases over the years where she has helped women and their children achieve what they are entitled to in terms of the law.
She says a specific problem she encountered is that women are often not aware of what rights or obligations they have and fear reprisals by their husbands if they challenge the outcome of a process. Kaamilah gives talks, runs workshops and publishes articles, including in the Mail & Guardian, to empower women.
The name of the organisation at which you work
Herold Gie Attorneys
Your educational background, listing your qualifications and institutions, if any:
- BSoc Sc, University of Cape Town
- LLB, Unisa
Your greatest achievement
Besides practising law, Kaamilah says her greatest achievement is investing in the youth. She runs the job shadow programme at her firm and collaborates with two youth NGOs to provide a biannual three-day workshop for learners interested in practising law. She also runs the graduate placement, training and mentoring programme for the firm’s candidate attorneys doing their practical vocational training.