[imagesource: Samir Hussein / WireImage]

When the Clooneys aren’t living it up at Lake Como, and George takes a break from pranking Matt Damon and Brad Pitt, they’re often focused on a number of humanitarian ventures.

One of those, The Clooney Foundation for Justice, which highlights “brave justice activism”, has its inaugural awards ceremony coming up on September 29.

The event will be held at the New York Public Library and will have a distinctly South African flavour, with the awards named after Justice Albie Sachs.

On September 29, Sachs will also receive a Lifetime Achievement Award in Pursuit of Justice, reports The Daily Maverick:

Albert “Albie” Louis Sachs is a South African activist, lawyer, writer and former judge who was appointed by President Nelson Mandela in 1994 to serve on the first Constitutional Court of South Africa. In this position, Sachs helped write the post-apartheid Constitution of 1996. His 15-year term at the court ended in 2009.

Image: Abby Ginzberg / Ginzberg Productions

Sachs’s career in human rights activism began in 1952 when he took part in the Defiance of Unjust Laws Campaign while studying law at the University of Cape Town (UCT). He began his practice as an advocate at the Cape Bar at the age of 21, and much of his work involved defending people who had been charged under apartheid’s racist and oppressive statutes.

Sachs was routinely punished and detained by security police and once spent 168 days in solitary confinement. He then went into exile and survived a car bomb attempt on his life by South African security services, although he did lose an arm and sight in one eye.

Amal and George introduced The Albie Awards with this video, released yesterday:

Sachs said he thoroughly enjoys working with the celebrity power couple and will think of South African lawyers like Griffiths Mxenge and Bram Fischer when he receives the award in New York.

[source:dailymaverick]