Dr. Willem van Aardt is an Extraordinary Research Fellow specializing in International Human Rights and Constitutional Law, and the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Finbond Group Limited. He obtained B.Proc. (Cum Laude) and LL. M. degrees from the University of Pretoria (South Africa) in 1994 and 1996 and finalized his Doctor Legum degree in Public Law through the North-West University (South Africa) in 2005. The central focus his doctoral research was “State responsibility for human rights abuses committed by non-state actors under the Constitution.” After completing his legal articles and being admitted as an Attorney of the High Court of South Africa in 1996, he co-founded Thuthukani Group in 1998, founded Finbond Group in 2003 and was admitted as a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of England and Wales in 2005. Over the past 20 years, Finbond has grown from a small one-office Pretoria, South Africa-based company to a global financial services group with more than 590 store locations in South Africa, Canada, and the United States of America-Finbond focus mainly, but not exclusively, on providing unsecured loans to the previously disadvantaged and marginalized. In 2017 Willem relocated from South Africa to the United States of America. In 2020 he was appointed as an Extraordinary Research Fellow at North-West University, Research Unit: Law, Justice, and Sustainability. Willem is author of the book COVID-19 LAWLESSNESS and numerous peer-reviewed legal articles relating to the violation of fundamental human rights during the COVID-19 pandemic. Six of his articles have been published in The Law Society of South Africa’s esteemed legal journal, De Rebus during 2020, 2021, and 2022. Over the past three years, Willem’s legal articles have been downloaded and read by thousands of researchers in more than 120 countries globally on academia.edu.