After Prof Bolaji Akinyemi in August, the African Dialogue page will have Prof Chris Fomunyoh as guest in the November Edition. He has lived good, bad and ugly elections in Africa, shared notes with opinion leaders of repute and his knowledge of the democratization process in Africa is impeccable.

 Prof Chris Fomunyoh is currently senior associate for Africa and Regional director at the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI). He has organized and advised international election observation missions to Benin, Cameroon, Central Africa Republic, Côte d'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Madagascar, Mali, Nigeria and Sierra Leone. He has also designed and supervised country specific democracy support programs with civic organizations, political parties and legislative bodies in many African countries including Benin, Burundi, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Guinea Conakry, Liberia, Mali, Madagascar, Niger, Nigeria, The Gambia, Senegal and Togo. In the course of his work, Dr. Fomunyoh interacts regularly with heads of state and government, cabinet ministers, elected officials and political and civic leaders.

He recently designed and helped launch the African Statesmen Initiative (ASI), a program aimed at facilitating political transitions in Africa by encouraging former democratic Heads of State to stay engaged in humanitarian issues, conflict mediation, public health and other key sectors of political, economic and human development.

As an expert on democratization in Africa, Dr. Fomunyoh makes frequently guest appearances on major radio and television networks including CNN, BBC, NewsHour, National Public Radio, Voice of America, and Radio France Internationale, and provides interviews for major national and international newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Washington Post, Washington Times, Le Monde and International Herald Tribune.  He has published a number of articles on African politics and democratization in various academic journals.

Dr. Fomunyoh has traveled extensively in Africa, Europe and North America, and is perfectly bilingual in English and French. He holds a Licence en Droit from Yaoundé University in Cameroon, a Master's Degree (LL.M.) in International Law from Harvard Law School; and a Ph.D. in Political Science from Boston University. Dr. Fomunyoh is an adjunct faculty at the African Center for Strategic Studies and a former adjunct Professor of African Politics and Government at Georgetown University.  He also is the founder of a non-profit organization www.tffcam.org  interested in supporting democracy and humanitarian causes in Cameroon.

Political events in Africa from elections in Kenya and Zimbabwe, to the upcoming ones in Ghana, unorthodox constitutional amendments to promote one man rule in Cameroon, the general state of democracy in the continent, what the election of a new president of the USA will mean for Africa and a lot more are all areas that Prof Fomunyoh will certainly feel at home in fielding questions. If you are interested in submitting a question to Prof Fomunyoh, email your questions to PAV at: pav87central@yahoo.com