Richard Freeman, a consultant with the World Health Organization, took part in drafting legislation that aims to strike out obsolete laws created under colonial administrations, repealing all laws established before Rwanda’s independence. A cabinet meeting chaired by President Paul Kagame adopted the draft law. After a consultative period of public and stakeholder input, both chambers of the house will need to approve the bill for it to be law.

While at Stanford Law, Freeman was a member of the Rwanda Legal Development Project (RLDP), which works with various stakeholders in the Rwandan justice sector to support legal reform. In 2018, he co-wrote “The Persistence of Colonial Laws: Why Rwanda Is Ready to Remove Outdated Legal Barriers to Health, Human Rights, and Development.” The article was published in the Harvard International Law Journal.