From the CEO's desk : Greetings from Bangkok

November, 2012

The new Secretariat

Greetings again from Bangkok, where the new Secretariat is slowly assuming its roles and responsibilities. Not all staff are yet in place, but in the next edition of WONCA News we’ll introduce you more fully to Dr Nongluck Suwisith – our new Chief Admin Officer – and her small team. All our contact details can be found at the end of this piece.

The transition really is “work in progress” and we apologise if you do not currently receive the normal excellent service which you have come to expect from the Secretariat staff, but transitions are usually difficult and we’re trying to make this one as seamless as we can. The archive files have just left Singapore but at the time of writing (30th October) have not yet made it to Bangkok, so any requests for archived material will be held until we can access the archives again.

Wonca Executive meets and seeks nominations

At the beginning of October the full WONCA Executive met in London for its annual meeting. As ever there was a fairly full agenda, with lots of lively debate and discussion. Reports on some of the items will get more detailed mention in this newsletter, but I’d like to remind everyone that the Nominations and Awards Committee, under the Chairmanship of Professor Michael Kidd, is still seeking nominations for all WONCA posts which will come up for election or re-election at the World Council in Prague next June. In particular we are still very much seeking nominations for the role of President-elect who would, of course, take over as President for the 2016-19 Triennium at the world conference in Rio de Janeiro scheduled for November 2016.

We’re also looking for candidates to host the world conference following Rio de Janeiro. This one is slightly complicated by the fact that there is a motion which will be debated and voted on by World Council in Prague in 2013, proposing that World Conferences be staged every two years, rather than the current three. If this motion is passed then we will be looking for hosts for 2018; however if the motion is defeated then the subsequent world conference would be in 2019.

Details of posts and the procedure to nominate an individual or country can be obtained from the Secretariat.

WONCA Africa conference coming up

Finally our main priority at present is to have the Secretariat fully functional, and so for the time being none of us will be travelling too far from home. However we hope very much to start to attend several of the meetings and conferences planned and to meet with all of you. In the meantime I wish our African colleagues all good wishes for their regional conference, to be held in Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe from 19th to 21st November and look forward to reading reports of the activities in due course.

Best wishes to you all.

Garth Manning
CEO

Secretariat Contact details

CEO:

 [email protected]

Chief Admin Officer:

 [email protected]

Admin:

 [email protected]

Accounts:

 [email protected]

Our address:

12A-05 Chartered Square Building,
152 North Sathon Road,
Silom, Bangrak,
Bangkok 10500,
Thailand

Phone:

+66 2 637 9010

Fax: 

+66 2 637 9011