Executive Director of the Global Fund steps down, new General Manager announced

Earlier this week Michel Kazatchkine announced his decision to step down from his position as Executive Director of the Global Fund by March 16, 2012. In a message to staff, partners and friends he assured everyone that “for the last ten years, the Global Fund has been my passion and my most important undertaking”. It was a period in which he led the organization for five years and oversaw a dramatic expansion in the organization’s life-saving work. Chair of the Global Fund, Simon Bland, emphasised that “[Michel] has helped shape the Global Fund into the beacon of hope it is today for tens of millions of people around the world.”

The Global Fund’s Board in November already decided to appoint a General Manager to oversee an ambitious transformation plan. In a separate announcement yesterday, Gabriel Jaramillo was appointed to the newly created position of General Manager, a role in which he will oversee a process of transformation as it accelerates the fight against the three pandemics by focusing on its management of risk and grants. Mr. Jaramillo will take up a 12-month appointment on 1 February 2012. The press release includes a short background of Jaramillo:

Mr. Jaramillo, a former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Sovereign Bank,  has more than 35 years of experience in executive positions in the financial sector, where he won broad recognition as a highly skilled leader and administrator with impeccable integrity.

Since he retired a year ago, he has served as a Special Advisor to the Office of the Special Envoy for Malaria of the Secretary General of the United Nations, and was a Member of the High-Level, Independent Panel that looked at the Global Fund’s fiduciary controls and oversight mechanisms.