THOMAS KOJO STEPHENS (PhD)

Thomas is the Head of the Transactional, Oil and Gas Practice, as well as Consultancy Group of the firm. His practice focuses particularly on Petroleum (Law, Policy, State Control, Regulation, Local Content, Legal Audit, Due Diligence, Contractual, Transactional, Commercialization, Revenue Management), Torts, Succession, Corporate and Commercial Law, Probate, Immovable Property, and Transactional Arrangements.

After graduating from Achimota High School, he obtained his Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Philosophy (Highest Honours) from Emory University in Atlanta, GA, which he attended as a Bill Gates Scholar, graduating Summa Cum Laude as well as Phi Beta Kappa. He obtained his LLB from the University of Ghana, his QCL from the Ghana School of Law, and his LLM in Transactional Arrangements from Cornell University, Ithaca, New York. He attended University of Aberdeen, Scotland, U.K., as a Commonwealth Scholar, and obtained his PhD in Petroleum Law, Policy and Regulation.

He practiced from the law firm Akufo-Addo, Prempeh & Co. from 2008 to 2018 where he engaged in practice in several facets of the law, particularly, litigation and corporate practice. From 2015-2020, he was a member of the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC), a statutory body set up under the Petroleum Revenue Management Act, 2011 (Act 815), to monitor and oversee the utilization of petroleum revenue by the Government of Ghana, and served as Vice-Chair from 2018.

He is currently an Advisory Board Member of the International Energy Law Advisory Group (IELAG), a Principal Trainer at the International Energy Law Training and Research Center (IELTRC), and advices many entities in the petroleum sector as well as other corporate entities, on myriad issues. He is also a Senior Lecturer at the University of Ghana School of Law and lectures in both the LLB and LLM Programs, lecturing among others, Law of Succession, Conflict of Laws/Private International Law, Natural Resources Law, Energy Law, and supervises in the PhD Program. He is also a guest lecturer in Petroleum Law at the University of West Indies.

He is the jurisdictional author for a number of international publications in Petroleum Law and has written on different facets of the petroleum industry, receiving the University of Ghana College of Humanities Award in 2022 in recognition of outstanding research output.