Board member: 2024-present

Filomena Fortes was appointed as an independent board member of WFDF in 2024, with a long history of sports experience in Cape Verde, across Africa, and in the Olympic Movement, and she has been an IOC Member since 2019. She is President of the Cape Verdean Olympic Committee (2014-present) and currently serves as Vice-President of Zone II of ANOCA, as President of the Association of Olympic Committees of Portuguese Official Language (ACOLOP), Vice-President of the Women and Sport Commission of ANOCA, and as a Member of the WADA Foundation Board. Within the IOC, Fortes is a member of the Future Host Commission for the Games of the Olympiad (2019-present), Sustainability and Legacy Commission (2022-present), and Olympism 365 (2022-present), and was previously a member of the Sport and Active Society Commission (2014-2021), Olympic Education Commission (2014-2021), and Coordination of the Games of the XXXIV Olympiad Los Angeles 2028 Commission (2019-2020). For Rio 2016, she served as head of the Cape Verdean Delegation to the Olympic Games and as Paralympic Attaché to the Paralympic Games, and for London 2012 was Paralympic Attaché to the Paralympic Games. She was also a Founder Member of Cape Verdean Paralympic Committee and was previously President of the Cape Verdean Handball Federation (2014-2017). Outside of sports administration, Fortes has worked as a secondary school physical education teacher, professor and coordinator of physical education and sports courses at UNICV (1996-2012), and as Coordinator of the Physical Education and Sports course at the Public University of Cape Verde (2012-2014). She earned a degree in Physical Culture at the High Institute Manuel Fajardo, Cuba, a Postgraduate in Youth Education at Coimbra, Portugal, a Master in Sport Sciences (FCDEF) at Porto University, Portugal, an Executive Master in Sports Organisations at MEMOS, and a PHD in Sciences of Education from Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal.