Sylvestre Somo is a Senior Electoral Expert, Senior Trainer and Senior Project Officer at the European Centre for Electoral Support (ECES) working with different projects. He is a researcher and Human Right Activist. He worked at the Independent Electoral Commission of the DRC at its inception in 2003 serving as a Senior Personal Assistant to the Chairperson of the Commission, coordinating the interaction with civil society, political parties and facilitating collaboration with external financial and technical partners. From 2013 to 2016 he worked as the Senior Technical Advisor for the CENI providing technical support and advice to the Commission. With more than 18 years of experience working with EMBs across the globe, he has acquired knowledge on project management working with NGO and State programs such as the Stabilization Program of the DRC. For the peacebuilding process in the DRC, Sylvestre actively participated in the peace negotiations in Goma 2008 and Kampala 2013 as a member of the technical team for the dialogues.
Sylvestre Somo participated in 18 election observation missions in Africa, North America, South America and Asia from 2003.
Sylvestre Somo is a graduate of Computer Science of the Pontifical Catholic University of Minas Gerais (Puc-Minas), he has a post-graduation degree in Electoral Laws and an MBA in Project Management at the same university. Sylvestre holds several specialized training certificates including the Civilian Service, Human Rights and Gender Awareness of the Peace Operations Training Institute and Certified Trainer in “Leadership and Conflict Management Skills for Electoral Stakeholders (LEAD)”
He speaks French, Portuguese, English and Swahili.