Mahat Somane
Mahat Somane is a Kenyan constitutional litigator and social entrepreneur whose courtroom skill and grassroots focus have made him a rising force in East Africa’s legal scene. A graduate of the University of Nairobi and Harvard Kennedy School (LL.B, MPA), he co-founded Garane & Somane Advocates in 2016 to give start-ups, social enterprises, and marginalized communities access to top-tier legal counsel. The firm now advises more than 60 early-stage companies and channels 15 percent of its billable hours into pro bono land, citizenship, and refugee-rights cases in northern Kenya.
Somane’s national profile soared in September 2022 when he joined the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission’s defence team in the presidential-election petition. His data-rich submissions on polling-station transmission logs and voter-registry audits were singled out by the Supreme Court as critical in affirming the validity of the vote, cementing his reputation for marrying technology and law.
Beyond litigation he chairs the Isiolo Education Trust, which has awarded 2,400 secondary-school bursaries, and leads Legal Hackers Kenya, a volunteer collective that digitises court records and trains youth on open-source evidence gathering. In 2024 he was appointed to the Attorney-General’s Task Force on Digital Justice Reform and shortlisted for the African Legal Awards’ “Young Lawyer of the Year,” underscoring his commitment to justice that is both high-tech and human-centred.