PPD :: Staff of the Secretariat

Dr. Joe Thomas Executive Director Email : jthomas@ppdsec.org
Dr. Joe Thomas is an accomplished social anthropologist, public Health professor, author and researcher with over 20 years of international work experience in the Asia Pacific region, Australia, China, Africa, Europe and East Timor in resource mobilization, program development, ingenious networking, capacity building, knowledge management, technical backstopping and impact evaluation. He brings extensive experience working with governments, the United Nations, International NGOs, civil society organizations including faith based institutions. He has long and short term work experience in population and development issues in over 20 countries in the Asia and Africa regions. Dr. Thomas has substantively contributed to the global understanding of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, reproductive health programs and under-served and hard to reach population sectors including refugees, rural urban migrant workers, youth, and the armed forces. He has served as an HIV/AIDS advisor to the Ministry of Health in East Timor and technical advisor to the World Health Organization (WHO) and as the regional manager of Northern Territory AIDS and Hepatitis Council in Australia. He pioneered internet mediated HIV/AIDS information management in the Asia region by establishing various AIDS e-FORUMS for policy and advocacy dialogue and knowledge uptake and dissemination. For the last 11 years he has been the editor of AIDS INDIA and AIDS ASIA e-FORUM. He was awarded the HIV congress 2012 meritorious award in India. Dr. Thomas is an author of two books and has published more than 50 articles in peer reviewed journals. He is the founder director of Jodhpur School of Public Health (JSPH) in India, where he teaches and supervises masters and PhD students in Public Health as a visiting faculty. Before joining PPD Dr. Thomas served as the Director of the UNAIDS Technical Support Facility for South Asia (TSF-SA) based in Kathmandu, Nepal providing leadership to programs and staff in eight countries.
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Dr. Lorna Tumwebaze Deputy Executive Director Email : lorna@ppdsec.org
Dr. Lorna Tumwebaze, is a physician and public health specialist with over 15 year’s progressive and successful experience in program development, resource mobilization, managerial and technical responsibility of complex multi-year & multi-partnership national and regional Reproductive Health and HIV/AIDS programs. She has long and short tern work experience in Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Zambia, Rwanda, Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and South Africa and with regional programs in Botswana and Ghana. She has effectively provided leadership for large programs funded by PEPFAR/USAID, Centers for disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Department for International Development (DfID), the World Bank, Barnfonden Sweden and Foundations (Bill and Melinda Gates, Rockefeller, and Woodruff). Dr. Tumwebaze received her education from Makerere University Medical School, Boston University School of Public Health and the Universities of California San Francisco and Berkeley in USA. She has been trained and mentored in leadership , team management, emotional intelligence, conflict resolution and change management by the Training Resources Group (TRG), Incus, Washington DC. Before joining PPD secretariat as a Deputy Executive Director on 28th November 2011, Dr. Tumwebaze was working with ChildFund International based in Ethiopia, providing leadership to a multi-million dollar PEPFAR/USAID program. Dr. Tumwebaze began her career in international development working as a UNFPA Reproductive Health consultant/National Program Officer to the Government of Uganda, Ministry of Planning and Economic Development, providing technical leadership for the Population Secretariat to advance the Post Cairo International Conference on population and development (ICPD) agenda. She joined CARE International, where she managed and developed health and education programs. She moved on to work with UNFPA on a multi-country ASRH and HIV prevention program jointly managed by UNFPA, PATH and Pathfinder International. She worked with International Youth Foundation as a Regional Director for a three country (Uganda, Tanzania and Zambia) Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (ASRH) and HIV/AIDS program. She later joined Johns Hopkins University as the Executive Director for the African Network for Strategic Communication in Health and Development.
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Ms. Therese Maye Diouf International Program Officer Email : tdiouf@ppdsec.org
Therese holds a Postgraduate in Public Health Program Management and a Master Degree in Population Development and Reproductive Health. She has over ten years of experience working in program management with a focus on Reproductive Health, Malaria/public health research (Medical Anthropology), community-based health programs, researching and replicating best practices in reproductive health/HIV/AIDS programs, training and facilitating workshops in Reproductive health/rights and qualitative research. Before joining PPD, Therese was working with UNDP / Laos as gender and HIV programme analyst. She worked for JICA in West and Central Africa as Deputy Administrator for Reproductive Health Programme and then as a Deputy Resident Representative of JICA responsible for West and Central Africa health programs. She had provided short-term consultancies to UNDP and UNICEF in Senegal to conduct socio-anthropology researches in the areas such as Maternal Mortality, access to health, Poverty perception and child abuse. In addition to her local languages (Serer and Wolof), Therese also speaks French, English as well as Spanish.
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Mr. Khandaker Humayun Kabir (Shishir) Head of IT and Communication Email : hks@ppdsec.org
Mr. Kabir is an IT Specialist with more than thirteen years of experience in the field of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in many national and international organizations. He has a Masters Degree in Computer Science. Mr. Kabir has a proven success and track record in designing and maintaining Networks (LAN/WAN Solutions), Wireless Networks, configuring and managing Routers, Windows and Linux based servers, developing and managing Dynamic WEB Application. He has a vast professional experience in system analysis and design, conducting assessment, training and leadership capability to manage IT projects.
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Mr. Hafizur Rahman Head of Finance Email : hrahman@ppdsec.org
Mr. Hafizur Rahman is working with PPD since January 2003. He is a Financial Management Specialist. He has vast knowledge and experience on Financial Management, Accounting, Budget & Budgetary Control and Auditing. He has over 14 years of experience in managing Finance and Accounts of different National and International Organizations. He completed Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Finance and Master of Commerce (M. Com) in Management. He is a part qualified of Cost and Management Accountants (CMA) and has Completed Chartered Accountancy Course. He is in a way to complete his Bachelor of Law degree. He has experience at home and abroad to develop and implement Financial Management and Accounting System for different organization as well as for the project.
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Md. Borhan Uddin Head of Administration Email : borhan@ppdsec.org
Mr. Md. Borhan Uddin has been working in the field of Human Resources Management and Administration for the last 16 years with different national and international development organizations. During the period, he served for ICDDR,B, NUK, BSWS, DANIDA and UNDP. Mr. Borhan is experienced in Human Resources Planning, Recruitment and Selection, Performance and Compensation, Procurement and General Administration. Mr. Md. Borhan Uddin received his Masters of Business Administration Degree (Major in HRM) from the Northern University Bangladesh. Mr. Borhan joined PPD as Administrative Manager on 9 June 2010. Before his joining at PPD; Mr. Borhan was serving at the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in the capacity of the Human Resources Expert at Urban Partnerships for Poverty Reduction (UPPR) Project.
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Md. Nazrul Islam Sr. Programme Officer Email : nislam@ppdsec.org
Dr. Md. Nazrul Islam obtained his Ph.D degree from the University of Mysore, India on “Decentralized Governance and Development in India: A Study in West Bengal” covering emerging issues like decentralization, accountability, transparency, social capital and development and received his post-graduate degree in Political Science. Dr. Islam worked as Coordinator-Private Healthcare in RTM International (formerly JSI Bangladesh). Private healthcare is a project funded by Swisscontact-KATALYST, the first of its kind in Bangladesh aiming to improve the quality of healthcare services in the private sector through implementing business-like interventions that focus on service markets of the sector. The innovativeness of this approach lies in sustainable development of business services to address the constraints of the private healthcare sector under the involvement and ownership of the private sector. The program develops innovative strategies that ensure the growth of the private healthcare sector leading the high quality healthcare for the people. Dr. Islam provided technical assistance to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of Bangladesh to formulate policy guidelines and curricula for introducing different medical courses in Bangladesh. He worked as Adjunct Faculty of Master in Development Studies in East West University-Bangladesh. He thought different subject related to development and governance, NGOs, corporate organization, public private partnerships etc. Dr. Islam has been involved in research for a long time. He has experience in working on Restructuring Local Environment for Better Health Outcomes: Towards a District Level Pilot in Karnataka, Government of Karnataka, India. He served as a Research Officer with an International Team and Consultant for one year in the World Bank Public Health Study Project in Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bangalore, India. In addition he was engaged in teaching Ph. D. students for two years in ISEC. His works have been published in various journals, academic working papers and monographs. He authored a book on Decentralization, Transparency, Social Capital, and Development. He received training in “Making Markets Work for Pro-Poor” held in Glasgow, UK.
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Dr. Md. Mahbubur Rashid Programme Officer Email : mrashid@ppdsec.org
Dr. Mahbubur Rashid has joined PPD as a Program Officer in May 2010. Before joining PPD, Dr. Mahbub served JiVitA project as the Senior Medical Epidemiologist/ Senior Management Team leader. JiVitA is a large maternal and child health research program implemented by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, USA, in the Northwestern part of Bangladesh. Operational since 2001, with a trained field staff over 850, JiVitA is presently among the largest health and population research projects in South Asia. Dr. Mahbub is one of the founding investigators, and led the infrastructure setting and implementation of the project. He was also one of the two national investigators of the three large randomized controlled trials and numerous sub-studies nested in the trials. He advocated the JiVitA-2 findings (newborn vitamin A supplementation) at the national policy level, and recently the Government of Bangladesh has approved an operations research to study its effectiveness as a first step to take it in the program. At his early career Dr. Mahbub served as a researcher at the Bangladesh Institute of Research for Promotion of Essential and Reproductive Health and Technologies (BIRPERHT). During his tenure in BIRPERHT he imparted training on Reproductive health epidemiology, analyzed data and mentored research physicians in writing and implementing research projects on reproductive health. Dr. Mahbub obtained his MBBS from the University of Dhaka, M.Sc (Epidemiology) from the Prince of Songkla University (Thailand), MBA from the World University of Bangladesh and PhD (Public Health) from the Faculty of Post Graduate Medical Science and Research of the University of Dhaka. He also received training in Epidemiology and Bio-statistics from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Mahbub has co-authored 10 peer reviewed journal publications and numerous reports on maternal and child health.
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Ms. Rahnuma Afroz Communication Officer Email : rafroz@ppdsec.org
Ms. Rahnuma Afroz is a communication Officer in PPD. In this role, she is responsible for a broad range of communications initiatives including internal and external communications, creative strategy and media relations. Prior to joining PPD, Rahnuma held communication positions with different research and Nongovernmental organization. Ms. Rahnuma received her B.S.S in International Relations from University of Dhaka, her M.A. in Human Rights from the University of Sussex, UK. She is also a Commonwealth Youth Alumni and represented her country in different Commonwealth Youth Programs.
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Mr. Zayedul Hoque Executive Assistant Email : zayeed@ppdsec.org
Mr. Zayeed has under-graduation studies in Commerce, Diploma in Administrative and Personnel Management and Secretarial Sciences, Diploma in Computer Operation and Maintenance, High-level training on website authoring and maintenance in Singapore. Has seventeen years working experience with United Nations, Multinational Companies and Intergovernmental Organizations in management positions, out of which over nine years with Partners in Population and Development itself.
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Ms. Tanzia Islam Program Assistant Email: tislam@ppdsec.org
Tanzia Islam has joined Partners in Population and Development in August 5, 2011. She is experienced on Business Administration. She is also experienced in some research work. She obtained her Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) and Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Dhaka University. Before joining PPD she worked at some private sectors and gathered valuable experience in the Administration and Human Resource Management department.
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Mr. Prosenjit Kumar Gayen Administrative Assistant Email: pkgayen@ppdsec.org
Mr. Prosenjit Kumar Gayen joined Partners in Population and Development (PPD) as an Administrative Assistant in October 2011. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts degree (B.A. Hon.) and Master of Arts in English (M.A., secured 10th Place in order of merit) from the Jagannath University, Dhaka, Bangladesh. He received six-month training in Computer operation, with particular emphasis in professional usage of MS Office application packages, from the Institute of Information Technology (IIT) of Dhaka University, Bangladesh. During the course of his studies at Jagannath and Dhaka Universities, Prosenjit had been extensively involved in conducting research work focusing specifically on teaching and research methodologies. Before joining PPD, Prosenjit acquired considerable experiences in the Administrative and Human Resource Managements.
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Ms. Lota Gomes Office Clerk
Ms. Lata Gomes, born and brought up in a Northern District of Bangladesh. A personal crisis of life brought her to Dhaka and she found PPD as her 1st employer since 1998. She studied up to the Secondary School level. Lata plays a very important role in keeping the office tidy and making herself available to all colleagues for any support service need. She is a self-learner and able to operate most of the office equipments. She is always smiling and never gets exhausted of working.
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Mr. Kazi Jalal Uddin Driver
Kazi Jalal is one of the longest serving staff members in PPD. Before joining PPD in 1997 as Driver for the Executive Director, Jalal served World Bank for 2 years and Parjatan Corporation for 13 years before joining PPD. He possesses a profession driving licence and passed grade VIII from Junior High School. Jalal is a very experienced and safe Driver. He also provides assistance to the staff members in his free time. He is reliable, hardworking and serves organization with absolute dedication. Jalal is married and have two children.
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Mr. Wohiduzzaman Driver
Wohiduzzaman, joined PPD in August 2005 as the Driver cum Attendant. Before joining PPD he worked for Ajex Jute Mills Ltd, A Law Firm, and ICDDR’B, Wohiduzzaman also served under Mr. Jose Paulo de Araujo, Child Protection Officer UNICEF-Bangladesh as his Personal Driver and Grameen Phone. Prior to this he served Bangladesh Army as trainee soldier. He brought in 15 years driving experience in the organization. Wohid passed his Secondary School Certificate education, and completed his Higher Secondary education as well. He possesses a valid professional driving licence. He also serves as Assistant and provides administrative support services as needed. He is married and has a little boy.