Making legislation and case law accessible to lawyers, students and companies with vested interest in French speaking African countries was Nafissatou Tine’s goal when she founded Sunulex in 2019 on a trip to Senegal. Tine is one of few African women who have launched digital legal platforms to bring more transparency into a sector that can be marred with corruption. She tells AMAKA about her plans to ensure Sunulex becomes the best tool to facilitate Africa’s own Westlaw, becoming a leader for accessibility and reliability, while navigating the intersection of tech and law with excellence.

A career in law can be fulfilling but sometimes ensuring justice prevails can be a morally tiring process, especially in Africa where corruption is rife. This is what drew Tine, a lawyer, to entrepreneurship. 

Tine, 39, was born in Dakar, Senegal, but spent most of her life in France and Belgium where she completed a bachelor and master’s degree in law, before passing the bar. The Brussels-based entrepreneur travels and works as a consultant, serving as the bridge that helps to connect Belgian businesses that want to settle in Senegal. She founded Sunulex, a digital archive of legal documents that preserves Africa’s deteriorating records and provides access to case law, legislation and research. The company, which was worth an estimated €21 million in 2021, primarily works in French speaking African countries, including Senegal, Morocco, Benin Republic, Ivory Coast, Gabon, Central African Republic, Mauritania and Djibouti. 

Sunulex stores over 100,000 documents, representing economic areas including OHADA, the African Union and COMESA. It has around 40 institutional members, who can join on a renewable contract, composed of companies, universities and law firms across the world.

AMAKA: You have gone from working in the legal profession to creating a legal digital company with huge aspirations, which is fascinating. How has being a lawyer helped you in your entrepreneurial journey and why does Sunulex and the services it provides matter to you?

Nafissatou Tine: As a lawyer I have first-hand experience of how the sector works. I know the difference between the systems especially as an African woman living and working in Europe. It's already challenging to access law in Western countries that have advanced tools like Westlaw and LexisNexis, never mind in Africa. The continent is behind in the digital revolution, archives are also damaged and deprecating at a faster rate due to a lack of care. Digitisation provides ease of access, significantly reduces the time spent finding documents and preserves archives. Despite this, not every decision is published, even in the West. I still have plenty to learn in my entrepreneurial journey, but my legal background has motivated me to accelerate the restoration of archives and create a one-stop database that revolutionises access to legal records in the motherland.  

Restoring trust in Africa’s legal system

What was the light bulb moment that motivated you to create Sunulex, and what gaps did you see in Africa’s legal system that you sought to tackle? 

After spending six years specialising in social security and employment law, I became stagnant and wanted to be more connected to Africa. I immersed myself in activities organised by Belgium’s African community, especially non-profit organisations founded by women. This inspired me to do something meaningful, so I returned to Senegal in 2015 and the idea of Sunulex was born. After many conversations with lawyers and law students, I found that access to law was a big issue, so I wanted to fix this. 

You mentioned access to legal documents can be difficult, how does Sunulex ensure ease of access and navigation of the database and what changes do you hope to bring about?

I want to put the law at the fingertips of those who contribute to the public and economic development of Africa. Transparency still has a long way to go. Decisions involving everyday life like family law are published because there’s little benefit in privatising such matters. But corruption is not just reserved for politics; it’s deeply rooted in our justice system both commercially and economically. For example, negotiations and contracts involving mining or energy industries often don’t financially benefit citizens. Officials know this, hence legal decisions involving such matters are being hidden to keep people out the loop. 

I remember when I was lobbying in the early days of the project, I spoke to many judges, and while the majority were receptive to Sunulex, they would only participate when they could choose which decisions to publish. This is why it’s important to have unfettered accessibility to create transparency and reliability. I want Sunulex to be a tool of compliance and our job is to make access an easier process not more daunting. Members don’t need to have advanced tech skills to navigate the database, we designed the interface with the user in mind.

You want Sunulex to be a system of compliance, what is the significance of this and how can you achieve this? 

 It’s important that legal information is made public, that contracts concerning the economy and citizens’ rights are in the public domain in order to restore trust in our justice system. This can be achieved through accessibility, transparency, collaboration and investment in order to implement agreements like the new African Continental Free Trade deal, so everyone benefits.

Ensuring quality and accuracy

Can you explain what the process of setting up a legal database involves?

We are a small team of 10 and everyone is based in Senegal except me. My team collects case law, legislation and scientific research across the continent, inputting it manually and through scanning to create the digital archive. All the documents are double-checked, verified and regularly updated by our legal team. It’s a tedious but necessary process to guarantee accuracy. 

As a platform that provides access to legislation in French speaking countries, how do you guarantee the quality, accuracy and correct translation of the database for non-French speakers? 

We don’t directly undertake translation, because one wrongly translated word can have a detrimental impact in law. Members who use our database already have a vested interest in French speaking African countries, whether this is commercially, legally or as a student. While we don’t just cater to people who speak French, the majority of members know or have someone on their team with a working knowledge of French. Those who do not speak or understand French can use reputable translation software, but this is at their own risk. 

Sunulex sits at the intersection of tech and the law. What’s the tech innovation element of the platform, and is this something you are exploring for the future?

In order to automate a collection of documents, you need to have enough records to standardise the database, so presently it’s hard to involve artificial intelligence. But it’s something that we want to add. One way to implement AI would be through a keyword search, which could show similar cases and predict a decision based on probability. 

With technology often comes the risk of hacking, especially at a time when governments and citizens are having reservations about how data and information is used, how do you ensure security and compliance?

We have a white hat hacker who regularly ‘hacks’ our website and app to ensure the system doesn’t have a security breach. We also use industry standard security providers to protect our database.