[Music] good morning I'm Ahmed Elnaggar and this is Monday legal My guest for today is Zad Ali the founder and the CEO of the law good morning Zad good morning Ahmed it's my pleasure and I'm very delighted to be here with you on Monday legal thank you very much for coming and it's our pleasure to have you uh you are one of the youngest most uh influential uh uh let's say Publishers of uh uh specialized I think you're the only specialized Legal magazine in Egypt if I'm not mistaken yes right I believe we are uh we can say the first okay and there's some tries to to have another publishing but yes we are the first and perhaps in the Middle East we were the first in in publishing in uh for uh the legal professional or the legal industry that will take me to my first question which is can you please introduce yourself personally uh what's your background where did you study and um how did you start the law and tell us a little bit about it like not the whole thing but just tell me a bit of the journey since you started as an idea and until uh you you are what you are today thank you I believe my passion to law started uh from my beloved father uh he studied law and he was very passionate about the law and the role of lawyers and the importance of justice and what the lawyers do for justice uh to the to the society and wider society and at this time I was seeing the most influential leader in the world are lawyers and this is why my passion come to and I joined the law school of an chams University in kirou uh and then I have my masters in international law at the American University in Cairo then I went to London University in Sweden to study more about law all my studies was focusing about the legal profession and development of the legal profession the role of lawyers and and legal entities in the legal profession and I was intrigued what lawyers can do for society I was intrigued when I was young I remember when Barack Obama was um going to the US election I was very young and I see him as a lawyer graduated from law school and he's the president of the most of the strongest countries in the world this is why I see what lawyers can achieve and can do and uh starting from this moment my love to L like increased uh day by day that's very interesting and you studed in in a chance University in Cairo yes and and after all these other International Studies that you have did you come back to Cairo to to start your career or you started I I started actually very early I started uh in my uh senior year in law school in an Champs University it was a student activity at the beginning like it's a passion like do publishing uh do events connecting thought leaders in legal field and uh that was 9 years ago okay and then I was started as a lawyer I used to work work as a lawyer in sh ano firm uh and step by step like my passion increased more towards advocating for justice system empowering justice system uh and maybe after uh right in the covid and 2019 2020 I decided to focus all my uh passion all my energy towards being a l preneur Al low preneur Al preneur yes that's a very new uh term that appeared I guess few years ago when a lot of uh lawyers have decided to go into the entrepreneurship field and it's actually a very uh accurate uh term I guess tell us about the law what was the idea behind it when did it start did you start I I understand that the passion and and to the law and helping lawyers and so on started when you were studying but the idea of establishing this magazine and starting with it when did it start start uh so actually my in my senior year at Law School uh I was having senior activity with my friends and my colleagues and our goal or vision is helping our students and helping our mates in University to to know more about the market to to advance their career so we decided together as a group of students let's do some seminars let's do some uh programs let's do some Gatherings and then we think like we want to connect the legal feied like those students are not connected with judges or not connected with law firms or not connected with lawyers International Organization it's a huge career the legal profession is very large career and it's not connected so we decided to have the law magazine as a platform it's like Facebook for connecting all lawyers let's when we started make the law students right make the managing Partners right make the seniors make the medev associate make judges like everyone should write everyone should hear and communicate through the magazine though our main idea at the beginning is connecting the legal field together and with passion and dreams of empowering justice system and make Justice accessible for everyone through communicating all the field together and we tried to have like the the leaders of the new generation of the legal society and at this time it was like right after uh the Arab Spring and a lot of Revolution a lot of Dreams a lot of passion to change and we couldn't think of more who can need this change more than lawyers like they are the guardians of the society uh like if you're a corporate they they fight for your dreams they fight for your goals if you're a person uh they fight for your rights if you are a criminal they will they will help you to understand your right yes and and to get I won't say the best of the situation but at least to have your right to to be treated as a human being so only the lawyers who can guard you in this even with your money with your family matters the lawyers are truly the Guardians of our society and the perspective of lawyers all over the globe it's a very prestigious job but Everyone likes see lawyers like I'm taking your money lawyers like you speak for 10 15 minutes and they will B you a lot I think we have a little bit of a of an image problem in in the especially in Egypt honestly because in the movies and in the media lawyers are not really portrayed in the right way maybe this is changing the last 3 to 5 years but I think up to the early 2000s it was uh it was always funny uh image or a villain uh in every uh movie the the he's a lawyer and U to the extent that I have seen and I've have read a few times that the bar association in Egypt uh have filed cases against uh uh Movie Makers because they they they have uh I don't know they have they they present lawyers in in the wrong way do you think this is a problem that the society in countries like Egypt have to we we as lawyers have to work a little bit on it because there is a an image problem I think communication is the key and always for non- lawyers it's very hard to understand the laws and and legalities you know in the history when the law started uh it was very very complicated to understand uh the law and when what you call lawyer at the beginning it was a friend when you call her in Latin it was the lawyer mean a friend so he's a friend who can understand the regulation do and help you for that uh however the society doesn't know the job of of the of the lawyers or or law firms or what they do uh maybe they uh think they like bend the law they break the rules they work only for money and this is not true and the I think the most important part of losing the the the communication uh between lawyers that we focused more as lawyers on legalities and and writing and Publishing and see that our achievement winning cases however now in a different Society more open Society globalization communication social media platforms I think clients Society people want to understand more about the person want to understand who the lawyer who's defending me as I said like lawyer is a friend this is how the society the first lawyer in the history was called a friend so people have to understand this humans they have to to to trust him they have to understand him like lawyers so uh doctors somehow like lawyers you have to choose the the the right person to you have to trust them it's a it's a job that is all about trust and if I don't um understand a certain topic as he said like a doctor I will go to someone who I can trust and I can trust their judgment I can trust their opinion I can trust that as well and ethical level they they they will make the right call for me so of course it's a it's a it's a um it's a profession that requires a huge level of trust between a client and an attorney yes the competency and the quality of work is very important but we can't say it's only enough like clients and people have to understand the vision of the lawyer his beliefs his values his morals what he do like you have to believe in the lawy that thew really care about him this is important part and this is why we we when we decided to have the law we have a decision we all going to write about legal matters we're not going to write in legal way we're talking to society yes so when when we startet we are the lawyers Advocates we are the lawyers for lawyers because lawyers need lawyers for The Wider Society outside the courts so we said we are the advocates for lawyer outside the courts what's your um mission in in the region I think you started in Egypt and you did very well and you became uh the one and only reference for legal um magazines and being publishing the top law firms in in Egypt and now you're spreading your wings outside of uh of Egypt and you're coming to the UAE and I think you're going also uh across to other uh GCC uh countries and so on tell us what's your mission what do you want to do I think our mission is is very clear from our first day is connecting the legal profession all over the globe we don't want to connect all lawyers and all legal profession all over the the globe but we at least want to create a community of leaders inspiring the whole legal profession in the world so what our main Vision since day one is empowering justice system and developing justice system uh in the world it's very dreamy and very hopefully but this is how we started and we think we can do that by empowering lawyers empowering law firms empowering legal entities and advocating for them uh connecting them uh sharing information so when we when we came from uh Egypt uh our first uh move it was to UAE and we have our uh community in Egypt came with us like we were trying connecting the whole field together and we went to Riyad like we want to have our Dubai uee community and our Egypt Community to Riyad and we went to Q uh our last presence in uh in London uh International disput week we we went as the gate for the Middle East legal community so our Optimum uh goal and our mission is connecting the leaders of the legal uh industry legal profession all over the globe and uh having the La Legal feed globalized enough as everything else and to be very clear uh we were very lucky because uh lawyers and law firms in in in the Middle East locals are very competent and they have a very very good standards uh very look like International firms that been for centuries uh in London us the quality of the law firm the quality of the lawyers the way you do is very very professional and it was very inspiring that make us like love our drop and we were very inspired to have in every event every interview every magazine like you get shocked how you do do that like starting from Egypt starting from UAE or Saudi like lawyers are doing an amazing job especially like we started a lot later than London in uh or England in in the low firm thing and having a professional legal entity we started way after like a lot after but we still having maybe perhaps it's same quality same system more organized I believe like the professional in the legal field helped us a lot it to to give a a to be more passionate more inspired to do our job and to love it more like most of our team like we have in Egypt when we started and now we are 56 uh member at the law that's a big team and 90% of that our lawyers even our our team like the designers photographers they studied low and they are passionate L but they decided to be that this is our vision this is our mission we're going to develop an Empower justice system all over the globe and and this is why every everything we do is from belief of the role of lawyers in society that that's an amazing vision and I think your mission is is really uh a great one um very very similar to what I wanted to do when I started the jurist in back in many years ago and I'll tell you a funny um funny start in in my in the very beginning when I wanted to start the the the jurist and uh which is the platform that hosts Monday legal is the is is to create a platform where lawyers can um be published but online can lawyers can write articles and these articles can be uh delivered to the audience for free so that people would have access to Reliable practical uh legal knowledge because a lot of lawyers are brilliant and they are not published because they don't work for an international firm or they don't work for a big uh local firm where they have their own Publications like for example Al Tamimi was doing here in the UAE for many years or like having access to other law legal sour sources and legal technology providers who are uh very big in the region and they have these uh legal articles and legal Publications that only the lawyers who are members of them who can publish and can write and their uh legal knowledge to be spread around and they they get promoted and they get uh widely spread sorry widely known as the experts in this region and so on so I was giving U the ability to these lawyers to be uh to to write to give the legal uh knowledge and the legal expertise and show off their skills and and so on online and at the same time for the society to have access to this legal knowledge for free and it was really a um a way to make Justice and make Legal Information available for uh for the public as well as the lawyers get a little bit of visibility and promotion uh even if they are a solo practitioner or a a lawyer who is in a small or media firm where they they are um they're not able to get these higher up applications or be featured in in I don't know other magazines and and and so on and that was something that U that stayed until now and it's really working and it's nice a lot of people are benefiting from it and I think your mission um by providing this amazing platform in this very high quality uh is very similar to what we wanted all what we wanted it is that the lawyer seen are recognized in a good way and are uh recognized of together with their expertise that we give them a platform to Showcase their skills and to be very well known as well as the public will get the benefit of this information for free thank you very much amazing what we were talking about until now I think we'll take a quick break and uh I'll ask you what's your coffee so we can prepare it for you what's your coffee my coffee is black very black okay and thank you Ahmed for doing this and I think thank you for the jurist and legal Monday is very Noble to have the vision of making Justice accessible for everyone and making the legal awar access for everyone this is a very Noble Vision it's very important and I believe it's Justice accessibility for everyone it's our main goal as uh Professionals in the legal field I think it's working thank you very much thank you thank you we'll be back