Regional Emergency Agency appoints Deputy Executive Director

Lieutenant Colonel Kester Craig appointed Deputy Executive Director of CDEMA Bridgetown, Barbados, October 31, 2022 (CDEMA) – Chair of the Management Committee of the Council of the Ambassador Elma Gene Isaac of Saint Lucia, is pleased to announce the The Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), has appointed Lieutenant Colonel, Kester Craig as its Deputy Executive Director. He will take up his new responsibilities from January 3, 2023.

A release from the regional body said the national of Guyana is a disaster risk management practitioner, with over over 2t years of military service and more than 16 years disaster management experience working with community groups, government agencies, and national, regional, and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the local government, health, security, private and environmental sectors.

Colonel Craig served as the Director General of the Civil Defence Commission (CDC) of Guyana for five years up to July, 2022 and as an independent Disaster Risk Management Professional thereafter.

The release says Craig has previously held the positions of Deputy Director General and Operations and Training Officer at the Civil Defence Commission, Guyana; Avionics Supervisor and Adjutant at Air Corps; and Infantry Commander/Platoon Commander for the Guyana Defence Force’s First Infantry Battalion.

He currently serves as a part-time Lecturer for the post-graduate programme at the Faculty of Earth and Environmental Studies, University of Guyana.

Lieutenant Colonel Craig also served as the Chairman and member of the CDEMA Plan Development and Review Sub-committee for seven years and has been the vice-chairman of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS) Special Committee on Disaster Risk Reduction.

At CDEMA, Craig will lead the Technical Programme Management Division (TPMD) which is responsible for the strategic and technical leadership of the Agency’s Disaster Risk Management (DRM) programme in the areas of Response, Recovery, Preparedness, Disaster Risk Reduction, Education, Research and Training.