Our Team

Gashaw Mekonnen

Country Director, Zimbabwe

Gashaw was appointed as CD of GOAL’s Zimbabwe programme in April 2022.

Gashaw brings over 20 years of experience to the role, including time as a Roving CD and CD across Haiti, Niger, South Sudan and Malawi and across various other positions in our South Sudan and Ethiopia programmes. Gashaw was CD in Sierra Leone for the last three and a half years.

Gashaw’s background is in rural development and development management. He is a trained advocate on Community Development Approaches and a ToT trainer on participatory tools. Over the years, he has managed humanitarian and development programmes in a challenging political environment.

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Bernard McCaul

Deputy Director of Programme Design and Innovation

Bernard McCaul has worked with GOAL for almost ten years, mainly in Latin America where he holds the posts of Regional Director for LAC and Country Director for Central America.

In Latin America he led the development of GOAL’s Urban Resilience, Blue Economy and Humanitarian Leadership programmes. 

He was lead author of GOAL’s Analysis of Resilience of Communities to Disaster, and Resilience for Social Systems Approaches. Experienced in developing and delivering large public private partnerships, primarily in the water services sector, Bernard is a trained advocate in systems thinking for development.

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Leopold Buhendwa

Country Director, Niger

Leopold has over 25 years of management and senior level technical advisement experience, working in the humanitarian, international development, and public health fields.

He joined GOAL in 2016, initially as chief of party of a USAID-funded project in Malawi, and currently as country director in Niger.

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Eamon Sharkey

Director of Fundraising, Marketing & Communications

Eamon Sharkey joined GOAL as Director of Fundraising and Marketing in April of 2018.

He holds a Bachelor of Arts from UCD, and Masters in both International Development and Business Administration.

Before joining GOAL, Eamon has spent time in the humanitarian sector with Trocaire and Caritas, and brings over 12 years experience in marketing, e-commerce, communications and fundraising in Ireland and Australia.

Eamon believes in the power of compelling communications to convey the importance of global issues, such as inequality, poverty and climate change, and how every person can play their part in creating a fairer and just world for all.

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Luigi Loddo

Country Director, Honduras

Luigi Loddo is a forestry engineer with over 20 years of experience working in fragile contexts on business development, climate change adaptation, sustainable natural resources management, humanitarian aid, and disaster risk reduction fields.

With more than 13 years working with GOAL, as Assistant Country Director Programmes and as Area Coordinator for GOALs programmes in Northern Honduras, Luigi has played strategic roles in GOAL´s Green and Blue Economy and disaster preparedness programmes in Central America.

Luigi previously worked with UNDP in Honduras, managing a large GEF funded Climate Change Adaptation programme, and with Italian NGOs Alesei (as Country Director) and GVC in the LAC region. Experienced in developing solutions for sustainable natural resources management in multicultural and indigenous contexts, Luigi is an advocate for the implementation of an inclusive and sustainable blue and green economy.

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Aleksandar Milutinovic

Country Director, Turkey

Aleksandar Milutinovic was appointed Country Director for Turkey in May 2022.

Aleksandar brings deep knowledge of Syrian Conflict, a track record in humanitarian and development work in several countries, and a reputation for ability to reengineer organizational processes and streamline operations to ensure maximum efficiency, to this role.

A Serbian national, Aleksandar has extensive experience in MENA. Prior to GOAL, Aleksandar served as the Consultant for CARE in Turkey. He also served as Country Director for CARE in Syria.

Prior to CARE, Aleksandar served as the Country Director for the International Rescue Committee in Iraq. He also served as World Bank consultant in Serbia. He also served as Mercy Corps Mission Director in West Bank and Gaza. Aleksandar holds a degree in Management.

 

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Alphonsus Martyn

Director of Investigations

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Jim Costello

Director of Corporate Services

Jim Costello joined GOAL in May 2022 as Director of Corporate Services. In that role, Jim will be responsible for IT, Facilities, Procurement and Logistics in GOAL.

Jim is an experienced business leader with over 30 years spent in the IT and IT Services sector internationally.

A qualified accountant with a Master’s Degree in Executive Leadership from Ulster University, Jim completed the Executive Leadership Program in Stanford University and has a PhD in Data Governance from University College Cork. Jim started his career in Unisys Corporation, an international specialist IT company where he worked in International Logistics for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, and IT Services in France and globally in partnership with the Dell Corporation.

Jim returned to Ireland to become CEO of Southwestern Services (SWS), where he developed the Company from a small data processing provider to government to an International Data Processing Company. Jim went on to set up his own company, Rosemont Data Business where he has provided consulting and advisory services to Compliance and Risks Ltd, a Regulatory Compliance Technology Company, and to the Health Service Executive (HSE) for design of its new ERP systems and Shared Services structures.

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Lorraine Marriott

Regional Director, Middle East

Lorraine Marriott joined GOAL in 2019 and has worked for 15 years in leadership roles in conflict and post-conflict environments in the Middle East Region, developing, leading, and managing teams through complex development and emergency response challenges.

She has been responsible for operations management, project management and resource acquisition for US and EU multi-lateral donors in various country offices in the Middle East and Eastern Europe. She is also experienced in programme implementation in education, gender, child protection and WASH. She has been involved in building not-for-profit start-up enterprises from concept phase to establishment and growth.

Lorraine enjoys building strategic partnerships, supervising and mentoring staff, and building organizational capacity in all aspects of multi-sectoral program development and planning. As well as the Middle East and Eastern Europe, she has worked in Africa and Asia. Lorraine holds an MBA in International Management.

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Jessica Cope

Country Director, Sudan

Jessica Cope took up her position as Sudan CD in July 2022, having previously been Malawi CD.

Jessica joined GOAL in April 2021 from Oxfam where she was CD for Iraq. Prior to that Jessica has held CD, Programme Advisor and Programme Coordinator positions with Medair and Mercy Corps in Afghanistan, Lebanon, Yemen and Syria.

On the academic side, Jessica holds a Masters’ Degree in Public Health from the University of Newcastle and a Bachelors Degree in Social Science from the University of Queensland.

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Jeannie Zielinski

Country Director, Syria

Jeannie Zielinski has worked with GOAL since January 2019 and has overall responsibility for the planning, management and development of GOAL’s work in Syria. She leads a team of more than 500, most based in Northwest Syria but with support staff in Turkey and Jordan.

She has extensive experience in the international humanitarian and development sector. As a results and value-driven leader, manager, and adviser, she has overseen complex multi-million dollar budgets, and has led on designing, building and implementing programmes.

Before joining GOAL Jeannie worked for over 25 years with CARE holding senior positions in Africa and Latin America. In more recent years she worked with CARE in the USA in change management, overseeing key projects during transition and leading on global strategic partner mapping.

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