The Lighthouse Bulletin

4
ICMDA NIHSJ Newsletter Volume 1 Issue 3 Dec 2015
Student Profile: David Lado Wani
Is a 2nd Year student studying Clinical Medicine and Public Health. He comes from Western Equatorial State in
South Sudan. For the second year running, David is the General Secretary on the students Guild body, having
served on the guild body of 2014-2015 and re-elected for the Guild body of 2015-2016.
His role is to generally work hand in hand with the Guild President to see to it that the welfare of the students is met
and he also acts as a link between the students and administration. He says one of his major role this year has been
to see to it that the new batch of students settles in and feel at home. He helped in briefing them, showed them around, advised
them on how fast to settle in and also advised them to work hard in their studies.
As a General Secretary, he also sees to it that there is togetherness in students especially since they are from different places
and tribes. For students’ challenges he says the biggest challenge they are facing is language barrier that is the local
language which makes it sometimes difficult to communicate especially when it comes to educational postings, but despite
the challenges, he says he is glad that in whatever situation, the administration is always there to stand with them and help in
any way possible.
Academically, Lado says the institute is doing the best they can to provide the students with quality education to make them
professional health workers "the institute is doing productive work for example, we are from time to time taught by doctors
volunteering from different places like India, England which is good and we learn a lot from them, this will help us in being
what we are supposed to be”.
He adds that he is appreciative of the environment, the staff and tutors are doing the best they can, though he feels there is a
need to increase on the teaching staff and on learning materials. He gives much thanks and appreciation to ICMDA, to all the
staff, government of South Sudan and to the donors for supporting the initiative.
Staff Profile: Gilbert Agaba
Gilbert is the Administrative Assistant in charge of Finance and Logistics. He has been at the Institute since April
2014. He has training in Accounting and Finance as well as Computerized Accounting Systems. As part of his work,
Agaba accounts book keeping, financial filling, financial data entry, financial reports, booking tickets for institute
visitors or director, making travel arrangements for both students and staff (if any), visa renewals and passport for
students among others. Working at the Institute so far has been fantastic, “I have been fortunate to work with a
very collaborative team, that is competent and helpful especially the Executive Director and other managerial
staff, I have gained some experience in administrative work, financial reports, financial management and team
work”. He adds that working in a multicultural environment is quite a good experience.
On what he has achieved working at the institute so far, he says perfecting his financial reporting system to the satisfaction of
the external auditors is something he is quite proud of as he made numerous effort and worked hard on accuracy of the financial
statements, being very careful to avoid errors of omission, commission and errors of principle. He further adds that he has
been able to visit different offices as administrative assistant and borrowed different skills and met different people. “I have
crossed boarders on administrative roles, I have travelled several times to Juba, which has been a dream come true.”
Gilbert is grateful to the following people for responding to Gods’ call and realizing the need to establish such an institute in
Jonglei South Sudan; Executive Director, the CEO of ICMDA, members of the steering committee, Mengo Hospital and other
support partners. May God richly bless you. He says that the training the students are getting is indeed a necessity to the people
of South Sudan especially at this point in time when the country is experiencing a health dilemma.