| Nigeria
1. CHARLES ADEYEMI CANDIDE-JOHNSON, ESQ., SAN
Managing Partner
Yemi Candide-Johnson is the senior partner at Strachan Partners. He was called to the Nigerian Bar in July 1984 and conferred with the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria in September 2003. He received his LLM degree from the University of London in 1984 and between 1984 and 1990 was counsel in the leading chambers of Jon B Majiyagbe SAN, in Kano, Nigeria. He moved to Lagos in 1990 to establish the Lagos practice of that firm and in 1994 led the founding of Strachan Partners.
Yemi is the author of several scholarly papers and he recently co-authored the book Commercial Arbitration Law and International Practice in Nigeria, a significant and substantial contribution to arbitration practice in Nigeria. He is continuously engaged as leading counsel in ongoing major and high profile commercial and public policy litigation across the courts of Nigeria and has been either counsel or arbitrator in several domestic and international commercial arbitrations in the maritime, petroleum banking and construction industries.
Yemi has chaired or sat as co-arbitrator in a number of arbitrations across construction, petroleum and public matters. He has advised the international consortium in the billion-dollar reclamation and development of Eko Atlantic City, Lagos and has continued to advice in transactions involving the Lagos State Government and Federal Government departments. He successfully defended the Government on the use of the newly introduced vehicle registration documents and drivers’ license; he also successfully prosecuted Cadbury Nigeria Ltd. in the removal proceedings of the Managing Director which impacted on the stock market, at the time. Yemi continues to represent clients’ interest on other major real estate developments in Abuja and also represents investors on farming negotiations for Nigerian "marginal oilfields" and petroleum bidding rounds.
In 1988 he was appointed a notary public for Nigeria and in 1996 a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators of England (FCIArb). He is now an approved tutor and examiner for the UK Chartered Institute of Arbitrators. He is an honorary fellow at the Centre for International Legal Studies in Salzburg, Austria and a supporting member of the London Maritime Arbitration Association.
In the public sphere, he is a member of the panel of neutrals for Lagos State Multi-door Court House, Lagos; legal assessor, Medical & Dental Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal (2000-05); member, board of trustees of Communicating for Change; editorial consultant, Judgments of the Supreme Court of Nigeria; member, telecom sector reform implementation committee for the National Council on Privatization (2002); chairman, subcommittee on legal and regulatory matters which was responsible for drafting the Telecommunications Law 2003; member, Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee 2006-2010; member the Association of International Petroleum Negotiators; member, Nigerian Communications Commission panel of neutrals; secretary, Parish Church Council, Anglican Church on the Peninsula; chairman, Lagos State Arbitration Law Reform Committee 2007/2008; and foundation board member, Lagos Court of Arbitration, member, board of directors of LEAP Africa. Immediate Past Chairman, Nigeria Bar Association, Section on Business Law (2011).
