Elhadj As Sy

As focuses on global public health. He currently serves as chair of the Kofi Annan Foundation Board. He has more than 25 years of experience in leadership roles in the humanitarian sector, having served as secretary general and CEO of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. He has held senior positions with agencies including UNICEF, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

As was UNICEF’s director of partnerships and resource development in New York and served as UNICEF regional director for eastern and southern Africa and global emergency coordinator for the horn of Africa.

He was director of HIV/AIDS practice with the UN development programme in New York and previously worked with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria as its Africa regional director and then director of operational partnerships and country support in Geneva. As also served as a member of the Independent Oversight and Advisory Committee for the WHO health emergencies programme.

In 2016, UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon appointed him to the high-level advisory group for Every Woman Every Child and as co-chair of the global health crises task force in response to the West African Ebola virus epidemic.

As is former co-chair of the joint World Bank/WHO Global Preparedness Monitoring Board, a member of the sustainability council for Volkswagen, a member of the board of governors for the research charity Wellcome Trust and a member of the board for the RBM Partnership to End Malaria.

As holds a master’s degree in Germanistik from the University of Graz and is a graduate of the Diplomatic Academy in Vienna. He has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Dakar and a post-graduate diploma in education from the École Normale Supérieure in Dakar.