Feleti Teo

Feleti Penitala Teo OBE (born 9 October 1962) is a Tuvaluan lawyer and civil servant. He is the son of Sir Fiatau Penitala Teo who was appointed as the first Governor General of Tuvalu (1978–1986) following independence from Great Britain.[1]

Feleti P. Teo
OBE
Executive Director of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC)
Assumed office
December 2014
Personal details
Born (1962-10-09) 9 October 1962
Tuvalu Tuvalu
SpouseTausaga
Children4
OccupationLawyer

In December 2014 at the 11th regular session of the WCPFC in Apia, Samoa, he was appointed the executive director of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC).[2] He was a former acting Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum (2008).[3] Teo has also served as Attorney General of Tuvalu (1991-2000) and Director General of the Forum Fishery Agency (2000-2006).[4][2]

Education

Feleti Teo received his Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand, and a Master of Laws degree in Public Law from Australian National University in Canberra, Australia.[3] In 1986, he became the first Tuvaluan to qualify as a lawyer upon being admitted as a barrister and solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand.[5]

Career

Teo was the first Tuvaluan to serve as the Attorney General of Tuvalu and Head of Legal and Judicial Services of Tuvalu From 1991 to 2000.[3][5] His predecessors were expatriates John Wilson, Neil Davidson, Beith Atkinson and David Ballantyne respectively (1978-1991).[6][7][8][9][10][11] During Teo's tenure, Cameron Dick served as the Acting Attorney General of Tuvalu from 1995 to 1996 while Teo undertook postgraduate studies at the Australian National University in Canberra.[12][13] Iakoba Italeli succeeded Teo as the Attorney General of Tuvalu in 2002.

From 2000 to 2006, he was Director General of the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA), based in Honiara, Solomon Islands.[3] From 2007 to 2013 he served as Deputy Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), headquartered in Fiji.[14] During this period he was also acting Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum (2008), due to the illness and subsequent death of its Secretary General, Greg Urwin of Australia.[3][15]

In 2014, Teo was appointed interim secretary general for the newly established regional organisation, the Pacific Islands Development Forum (PIDF), which he held until his appointment to the WCPFC. (The other two nominees for secretary general were Wilkie Rasmussen, the foreign minister of the Cook Islands, and Tuiloma Neroni Slade, the former attorney general of Samoa and former justice of the International Criminal Court.[14] Ultimately, Slade was chosen as the next secretary general at the Pacific Islands Forum meeting in Niue,[16] while Teo was appointed to head the WCPFC Secretariat as executive director in December 2014.[17]

Teo was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2013 Birthday Honours for services to government.[18]

References
  1. "Tuvalu Elects 12 Members of Parliament". East-West Center Center for Pacific Islands Studies/University of Hawai‘i at Manoa/PACNEWS. 27 March 1998. Retrieved 11 April 2015.
  2. Pareti, Samisoni (3 December 2014). "Tuvalu 'son' secures top WCPFC job". Island Business. Retrieved 7 February 2015.
  3. "Tuvalu's Feleti Te'o Is Forum's New Deputy Secretary General". Pacific Magazine. 3 May 2008. Retrieved 14 September 2008.
  4. Pareti, Samisoni (3 December 2014). "Tuvalu 'son' secures top WCPFC job". Island Business. Archived from the original on 7 February 2015. Retrieved 7 February 2015.
  5. "Senior Regional Bureaucrat honoured by the Queen | THE JET | Fiji's First Community Newspaper". thejetnewspaper.com. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
  6. Jill and Fred Hunter (28 November 2006). "Obituary: Anita Wilson". The Guardian. Retrieved 11 March 2018.
  7. McIntyre, W. David (24 November 2016). Winding up the British Empire in the Pacific Islands. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780192513618.
  8. Australia journal of political science. 1992.
  9. "Announcements (15 Commonwealth Law Bulletin 1989)". heinonline.org. 1989. Retrieved 11 March 2018.
  10. Melanesian Law Journal. Papua and New Guinea University law Faculty. 1991.
  11. Whitaker, Joseph (1 December 1991). Whitaker's Almanac 1992 124. J. Whitaker. ISBN 9780850212204.
  12. "Hon Cameron Dick". Queensland Parliament. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
  13. "Queensland's new Attorney General practised law in Tuvalu | Pacific Beat". radioaustralia.net.au. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
  14. "Three in Running For Forum Secretary General". Pacific Magazine. 6 August 2008. Retrieved 14 September 2008.
  15. "Executive Heads of The Secretariat". Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat. 28 June 2017. Retrieved 25 June 2017.
  16. "Pacific Islands Forum chooses new Secretary General". Radio New Zealand International. 21 August 2008. Retrieved 14 September 2008.
  17. "WCPFC improves observer safety".
  18. "No. 60538". The London Gazette (Supplement). 15 June 2013. p. 1.
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