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Secretary of State for Defence. Born in Baguia, district of Baucau, Secretary Pinto completed his university degree in Universitas Muhhammadiyah Malang (UMM) in Indonesia, whereby he majored in Political Science. During this time he served in the Student Senate for Intellectual Activity (1995-1996), he was Chairman of Student Representative Body (1996-1997) and Chairman of Senate of Tertiary Educational Institution Students (1997-1998). In 2002 he completed his Masters Degree on Political Science from the University of Indonesia with thesis on “Mobilisation and Demobilisation of Falintil: Timor-Leste’s Liberation Army Force”.
Upon returning to Timor-Leste, Secretary Pinto served as a lecturer, first with Universidade Dili and then with Universidade da Paz in the Faculty of Social and Humanities Science, the later whereby he was appointed as Assistant Rector as well as Director of Centre for Scientific Research and Peace. During this time he has written about National Security and participated in seminars on Regional Security and was also involved in research on various sectors, namely security, social and politics. Research and reports include “The Local Government Role in the NGO Advocacy in East Timor” (2004) and “Defense and Security Threat Post UNMISET in East Timor” (2005). He was a speaker in various forums including with International Republican Institute in relation to “Democracy Participatory in New Country” (2005), “The Role of Political Party in Democratic Country, (2007) and with Renetil Civic Education Programme about “The Government System: Presidential, Parliamentary and Semi-Presidential System in East Timor” (2007).
From 2005-2007 Secretary Pinto was studying his PH.D at National University of Malaysia in the area of Strategic and Security Studies. However he was called to assume the position of Secretary of State for Defence and was sworn in, 8 August 2007. He has written two books, “National Security: Timor-Leste Internal and External Threats” (2007) and “Simple Majority versus Majority Alliance of Parliament” (2009).
Source: Julio Tomas Online