João Bernardo Vieira II


João Bernardo Vieira II, born in Bissau in August 17, 1977 is the Secretary of State for Transport and Communications of Guinea-Bissau and the spokesperson of the biggest party in Guinea-Bissau.

Early life

João Bernardo Vieira was named after his uncle João Bernardo Vieira who served as President of Guinea-Bissau from 1980–1998 and later 2005–2009. Vieira has a law degree from Universidade Lusídas Lisboa, Portugal and holds a Master's degree in Sustainable International Development from Brandeis University, where he served as President of the Graduate Students Association. He was awarded a certificate of Emerging Leaders Program in Executive Education from Harvard Kennedy School of Government and an Archbishop Desmond Tutu Leadership Fellowship in South Africa.

Career

In 2004, Vieira began his career in public service in Guinea-Bissau by serving as the Head of Multilateral Agreements in the Ministry of Trade. In this capacity he represented Guinea-Bissau in the multilateral trade negotiations of the World Trade Organization.
He took courses in Geneva offered to students from Least Developed Countries. In 2011 after a national contest, he was selected out of a pool of 50 Bissau-Guineeans to serve as a member of the board of National Regulatory Authority, an organization responsible to regulate the telecom and the internet sector where he served for 3 years.

Secretary of State for Transport and Communications

In May 2014 he contributed to party's landslide victory. In July he was sworn in as Secretary of State for Transport and Communications, the youngest member of the government.

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