Juanis is the founder & CEO of the ASDF. He is the ultimate visionary of the organization and he is responsible for developing and implementing that vision. He is also a skilled leader who brings organizational, communications, leadership, and recruitment skills to the ASDF. His ability to organize, recruit, manage, disciple and motivate by bringing passion and knowledge of the communities that the ASDF serves is critical to making impact in Africa.

A young man; and born in South Sudan in Wanding and resided back and forth in Nasir, which are located in the southeast, his native home region is a round the Upper Nile. It is a region that has been completely destroyed by two Sudanese civil wars between northern and southern parts of Sudan over the course of 50 years. The latest of the ongoing civil conflicts culminated as genocide/ethnic cleansing in 2013.

Juanis and his relatives, family members, along with so many of his people, the Nuer, were forced many times to be relocated in their neighboring countries in East Africa.

Juanis who himself lived in a refugee camps for many years back and forth and he spent over five years in refugees in Ethiopia before being relocated to the U.S. in 2000.

He lost his parents and most of his family members to civil wars and conflicts pertaining between northern and southern Sudanese from 1955-2005 and abject poverty as well. Recently, he lost brothers, cousins , family members and friends from the genocide and ethnic cleansing that occurred in 2013 which is still ongoing regarding South Sudanese unrest civil war.

He and his family members were displaced and forced many times from their home to the neighboring countries where they had trekked back and for since 1988-1994. He estimates that he walked for over 2,500 miles before settling in a United Nations for refugee camp near Gambella, Ethiopia when he was in young age.

Under the auspices of the United Nations program for refugees, he and his sister’s husband family were selected to leave Ethiopia to come to the United States in 2000. After living in Connecticut, he moved to Minnesota then he came to Denver, Colorado in 2001 after his cousin and his family extended an invitation. Throughout all this, he was a teenager.
Overcoming substantial odds, he was sponsored by a family in the Denver metropolitan area. He attended South High School, graduating in 2004. He was then accepted by many colleges and universities in the United States, but chose to go to the Metropolitan State University of Denver (MSU), Colorado, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science, concentrated in public relations, public policy and history.

He created the ASDF (formerly ‘Ngaathaje’ Development Organization (NDO) in 2008, in which he formed official Board of Directors, committees and recruited volunteers and staff as well as drafted strategic planning. The ASDF operated for over 4 years until 2013 when the latest and recent South Sudanese civil war started but restructured the organization in 2016-2017, has been running ever since.

He written books, one of the books “Daring to Overcome” was somewhat released but it will be released officially in July of 2020.

Additional, he was awarded for an Honorary Doctorate Degree in March of 2020.