Graham Elson, Deputy Chief Observer (UK)

Graham has a broad-based professional background having had careers in private industry, politics, elections and democratisation. During his period in private industry, he became General Manager of an operating division of a multinational corporation.  He entered politics at local government level in the UK when he was elected to his local council in 1976, and eventually became an elected Leader of an English County Council. In 1989 he was appointed as General Secretary of the UK Liberal Democrat party. Graham left UK politics to pursue a career in election observation and democratisation programmes. He has extensive experience in this field having observed elections in around 20 countries worldwide and was the Deputy Chief Observer of the 2002 EU EOM to Kenya.

Ralph-Michael Peters, Political Expert (Germany)

Ralph-Michael has an MA in political science and has been studying the democratisation process and the role of civil society and political parties in Kenya since 1992.  He was an election observer in both the 1997 and 2002 elections.  Ralph-Michael has also worked as a core team member on EU EOMs to Uganda (2001), Zambia (2006) and Nigeria (2007) and previously as a long term observer in Zimbabwe, Uganda, Nigeria and Indonesia.  He worked in election administration in Afghanistan (2005) and Kosovo (2007).

Vincent De Herdt, Legal Expert (Belgium)

Vincent De Herdt has a degree in law. Having started his career as a researcher, he became a university law professor and now works as an international consultant on democracy and the rule of law. He specialises in Africa and has worked on projects in Burkina Faso and the Democratic Republic of Congo.  Since 1992, he has provided legal and electoral expertise for a range of international organisations and has taken part in thirty missions in the field of electoral assistance and election observation. He was the Deputy Chief Observer for the 2006 EU EOM to Mauritania.

Simeon Apostolov, Election Expert (Bulgaria)

Simeon began his career as administrative officer for the UN in Bulgaria and went on to become Country Director of a USAID project in Bulgaria.  He has since gained extensive experience in the field of elections, having participated in eighteen OSCE election observation missions in ten different countries.  He was the election analyst for the OSCE election observation missions to Tajikistan (2005) and Montenegro (2006) and the election expert for the OSCE election support team for the parliamentary and provincial elections in Afghanistan (2005).

Aurelie Demauge, Human Rights Expert (France)

Before coming to Kenya, Aurélie worked as a consultant on human rights and justice issues in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).  She has previously worked at the International Criminal Court of victims’ rights and for NGOs in several countries specializing in issues relating to human rights, governance, justice and reconciliation. She was the legal expert on the core team for the EU EOM to DRC from November 2005 to December 2006.  Aurélie has a degree in political sciences and a master’s degree in international law.

David Ward, Media Expert (UK)

David has worked on a wide range of media law and policy issues for a number of European governments and broadcasters as well as international organisations including the European Commission, Council of Europe, the OSCE, ERIS and UNDP. He has managed technical assistance programmes for the media sector and has worked as a media analyst on EU election observation missions in Africa, the Middle East and Asia. He has a PhD.

Anna Owen, Press and Public Outreach Officer (UK)

Anna is a freelance journalist and press officer based in London.  She worked as a radio and television reporter for the BBC in Wales from 2000 to 2004 and has since both produced and reported for several different BBC programmes in the UK.  She has taken part in twelve election observation missions, working as a long term observer for the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in the West Bank and Gaza (2005-06) and the OSCE in Georgia (2004) and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (2004).  She has been a short term observer for the EU and the OSCE in eight different countries.

Scipion du Chatenet, Operations Expert (France)

For the last seventeen years Scipion has worked for international organizations, mainly as an operations expert in the field of peace keeping and democratisation.  Scipion spent five years working for the UN-DPKO/Field Administration and Logistics Division. He has also worked for the World Food Programme and the International Labour Organisation.  He has extensive election experience gained in observation, assessment missions and technical assistance with the EU, UN, IFES, ERIS and the OSCE.  He has been senior operations or operations expert seventeen times for election observation missions.  He has also participated in ten election planning/assessment missions and was involved in election technical assistance projects in Africa and South America.  In 1991, he was a consultant at the UN Secretariat in New York at the Investment Management Services. He has a diploma in finance from the New York Institute of Finance.

Michel Paternotre, Observer Coordinator (Belgium)

Michel has a master’s degree in political science and has worked as an election consultant since 1997.  He has participated in election related technical assistance and election observation missions with the OSCE (Bosnia), the UN (Kosovo East Timor, Comoros) as well as with the EU in eleven different countries. He was the observer coordinator for the EU in Nigeria (2003).

Dimitra Ioannou, Deputy Observer Coordinator (Greece)

Dimitra has a degree in law and a postgraduate degree in human rights and international law.  She has wide experience of working in the field of election observation and technical assistance, having taken part in more than twenty missions with the OSCE in the Balkans and Eastern Europe and with the EU in Africa and Asia.  Most recently she worked as a long term observer for the EU EOMs to Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Togo.

Martim Freire, Security Expert (Portugal)

Martim Freire has extensive experience in elections and has worked as a short and long term observer and supervisor in OSCE and EU election observation missions.  As a core team member he has worked as an Observer Coordinator in Timor Leste (2001) and Security Expert in Kenya (2002), Bolivia and Nicaragua (2006) and Sierra Leone (2007). He was also the local Service Provider’s chief of project for the EU EOM in Mozambique (2003) and Operations Expert in the EU EOMs to Afghanistan (2004 and 2005), Ethiopia and Venezuela (2005).