The National Democratic Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization working to support and strengthen democratic institutions worldwide through citizen participation, openness and accountability in government.

Arianit "Niti" Shehu is NDI’s country director in Jordan. Mr. Shehu is one of NDI’s leading experts on civil society strengthening, elections, parliamentary strengthening, citizen-based advocacy programs, and using new media tools for effective program design, implementation and evaluation.  Mr. Shehu has been designing, managing and supporting successful and innovative election and democracy support projects with NDI for the past 11 years in more then a dozen different countries in Central Eastern Europe, Eurasia, and the Middle East and North Africa.

Previously, Mr. Shehu has managed the Institute’s civil society strengthening programs in Kazakhstan, Kosovo and Egypt. In addition, Mr. Shehu has served as a lead trainer and consultant for NDI programs in Bahrain, Lebanon, Macedonia, Turkey and the West Bank/Gaza. On behalf of the Institute, Mr. Shehu has coordinated international election observation missions to Albania, Egypt and Lebanon, and participated in international missions to Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine and Yemen. Mr. Shehu is registered as an election expert with the Organization for Security and Cooperation of Europe (OSCE). During his work, Mr. Shehu has also closely worked with civil society leaders from Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Slovakia, and in 2001 assisted in establishing the European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations (ENEMO). In the fall of 2002, Mr. Shehu worked on Martha Fuller Clark’s campaign for Congress.

Prior to working with NDI, Mr. Shehu worked with the L.A. Times. He holds an M.B.A. and an engineering degree from the University of Prishtina. Mr. Shehu has also served as a reseracher with St. Andrew’s University in Great Britain.