Growing up in a small rural community in northern KwaZulu-Natal, Ayanda Msimang could scarcely have imagined becoming an environmental lawyer, let alone advising major businesses on some of the key issues now shaping Africa’s future.
Today, the Bowmans senior associate works across mining, energy, sustainability and climate change – fields where understanding the law increasingly means understanding the industries, investments and wider societies it helps shape.
“I am deeply grateful to everyone who has supported and mentored me along the way, especially those who believed in me before I believed in myself,” Msimang says. “This feature is a reminder that humble beginnings do not define your destination.”
Msimang is one of at least 18 lawyers and law-related talents that Africa Legal identified across this year’s Mail & Guardian 200 Young South Africans, including 16 in the Justice, Law & Human Rights category. Last month, we featured nine of this year's legal honourees and the different ways they are already contributing to their profession and society.
These next nine rising stars bring another thread into particularly sharp focus: how closely law is intertwined with business, infrastructure, technology, energy, workplaces and wider economic and social development.
Msimang was introduced to environmental law by lecturer Lauren Frost, who encouraged him towards a field he had not previously known existed. Earlier this year, Legal 500 named him a Leading Associate for Mining in South Africa.
If Msimang’s work places lawyers amid questions about how industries develop sustainably, Myron Sean Mer’s shows their importance when businesses – and the livelihoods dependent on them – are under threat.
The 34-year-old director at Fluxmans Attorneys works in business rescue, insolvency, and commercial litigation, helping steer companies through financial distress while balancing the interests of creditors, employees and shareholders. His work on major restructurings including Phumelela Gaming & Leisure and West Pack Lifestyle – both named Business Rescue Transactions of the Year at the DealMakers Awards – helped preserve businesses and protect thousands of jobs.
Away from major restructurings, Mer serves as a Small Claims Court commissioner, undertakes pro bono work and mentors young lawyers. His father taught him that success is measured less by accolades than by integrity, humility and the difference made in others’ lives.
While Mer’s work can involve preserving businesses under pressure, Mpho Mvelase operates in another area fundamental to economic and social development: infrastructure.
A senior associate and Executive Committee member at MNS Attorneys, Mvelase specialises in construction and engineering law, public procurement and alternative dispute resolution, advising public and private sector clients on complex infrastructure matters. He also mentors junior practitioners and has a particular interest in sustainable cities and the evolving built environment.
For Mvelase, his recognition is “a meaningful reminder of the value of hard work, consistency and the people who contribute to our growth along the way”.
But understanding the world beyond a transaction or project also means acknowledging the people and communities affected by it.
“Recognition like this may carry one name, but it is not the result of my sole efforts,” shared Asanda Lembede, a 25-year-old associate in the Corporate & Commercial team at Fasken, after she was named on the 200 Young South Africans list.
Lembede advises on corporate transactions, including cross-border work, with experience spanning renewable energy and infrastructure. Beyond transactions, she provides pro bono services to the Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Response Fund, mentors aspiring lawyers and co-founded a youth stokvel promoting financial literacy.
Her mother, a single parent whose sacrifices made her education possible, helped shape her belief that success should create opportunities for others.
“The younger version of me would never have imagined being included on a list like this and I’m grateful she kept going,” Lembede says.
People and workplaces are more explicitly at the heart of Neo Innocent Sewela’s field.
The 30-year-old Werksmans Attorneys director practises in labour and employment law, advising clients on complex issues shaping modern workplaces in an area where sound judgement matters alongside legal expertise.
Sewela credits mentors with shaping both his development as a lawyer and approach to leadership, including High Court Judge Malindi. Advocate Byron Morris offered another lesson that has become a guiding principle: “Every lion was once a cub.”
For Sewela, it is a reminder that even the most accomplished lawyers once stood where he does today. His advice to his younger self is simpler: believe in yourself.
Other honourees are looking towards how law itself must change as business and technology evolve.
Rethabile Segone, 28, is a researcher at the University of Johannesburg’s Centre for Banking Law and an LLD candidate examining how South African law should adapt as trade finance becomes increasingly digital.
His research sits where law, technology and global commerce meet – asking today the regulatory questions businesses and lawyers will increasingly need to answer tomorrow.
Segone previously served as a researcher to 10 judges at the Gauteng Division of the High Court in Pretoria, contributing to matters spanning banking and financial regulation, tax, energy law, commercial litigation and constitutional issues.
Understanding what comes next isn't confined to advising clients. Other honourees are helping develop, interpret and debate the law itself.
Dr Sithelo Magagula moves between legal practice, scholarship, and public discussion. Raised in Nongoma in northern KwaZulu-Natal, the 31-year-old Finger Attorneys director completed a PhD in international human rights law while practising full-time.
Magagula’s work spans public procurement, housing and constitutional governance, while his scholarship has been published in legal journals and cited in court judgments. He also takes legal discussion beyond the profession through writing and media commentary.
His own guiding advice is memorably straightforward: never make decisions based on “abantu bazothini” – “what will people say”.
Dr Bryony Fox, meanwhile, has taken academic curiosity into South Africa’s highest court.
Now a Constitutional Court law clerk to Justice Savage, the 30-year-old former Stellenbosch University lecturer and researcher holds a Doctor of Laws in private law, with research spanning children’s rights and climate displacement.
Fox describes career success as rarely linear and carries with her her grandfather Keith Maybery’s simple advice: “Head up, look up.”
Few of the nine illustrate the breadth of where legal skills can lead quite as literally as Julian Reynolds. An attorney, notary public and conveyancer at Cox Yeats Attorneys, Reynolds works across real estate, commercial finance, private equity and renewable energy. His career has taken him from Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr to Investec Bank and back into private practice, while a 2025 secondment to a development finance institution saw him help restructure high-risk loans and support SME funding.
He is also a FIFA-accredited football agent helping emerging players negotiate contracts and build sustainable careers – applying legal and commercial skills in another highly competitive professional world.
From Msimang advising businesses on environmental challenges he scarcely knew existed growing up in rural KwaZulu-Natal to Reynolds applying his experience across finance, energy, and professional football, this year's 200 Young South Africans lists shows there is no single template for what a successful young South African lawyer looks like.
Different practices and different paths connect these nine, but their stories share a curiosity about what lies beyond black-letter law; businesses and industries, technology and workplaces, people, and communities.
The law matters. So does understanding the world in which it operates, and as these rising stars are all doing, helping shape what comes next.
This is the second of a two-part Africa Legal series celebrating and spotlighting lawyers and legal thinkers included among this year’s 200 Young South Africans. You can read part one, "Building on a legacy", here.
