Feleti Teo
Feleti Penitala Teo OBE is a Tuvaluan lawyer and civil servant. He is currently the Executive Director of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission and a former Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum. Teo has also served as Attorney General of Tuvalu and Director General of the Forum Fishery Agency.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. 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.Career
Teo was the first Tuvaluan to serve as the Attorney General of Tuvalu and Head of Legal and Judicial Services of Tuvalu From 1991-2000. His predecessors were expatriates John Wilson, Neil Davidson, Beith Atkinson and David Ballantyne respectively. During Teo's tenure, Cameron Dick served as the Acting Attorney General of Tuvalu from 1995-1996 while Teo undertook postgraduate studies at the Australian National University in Canberra. Iakoba Italeli succeeded Teo as the Attorney General of Tuvalu in 2002.
From 2000-2006, he was Director General of the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency, based in Honiara, Solomon Islands. From 2007-2013 he served as Deputy Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum, headquartered in Fiji. During this period he was also Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum, due to the illness and subsequent death of its Secretary General, Greg Urwin of Australia.
In 2014, Teo was appointed Interim Secretary General for the newly established regional organisation, the Pacific Islands Development Forum, which he held until his appointment to the WCPFC. in the 2013 Birthday Honours for services to government.
