Dr Mele Tupou Vaitohi

Dr Mele Tupou Vaitohi is the research lead for the project. She is a leading legal scholar on Tongan constitutional law.

Dr Mele Tupou Vaitohi is the research lead for the project. She is a leading legal scholar on Tongan constitutional law.

Dr Tupou Vaitohi has recently completed her Phd in Law at Otago University where she focused on the effects of the 2010 constitutional reform in Tonga.

Admitted as a Legal Practitioner in both Tonga and Fiji, Dr Tupou Vaitohi has worked in Tonga and at the University of the South Pacific and has had an extensive career in law and government. She is the Manager of the Parliamentary Law and Practice team of the Office of the Clerk, Parliament of New Zealand and is on secondment with the Project.

She also holds an LLB from the University of the South Pacific and an LLM specialising in Public International Law from Queen Mary University of London, United Kingdom.