The Export-Import Bank of Korea (www.koreaexim.go.kr, Chairman Yong Hwan Kim, “ Korea Eximbank”) announced that it held a ceremony on October 17 at its head office in Yeouido to celebrate the establishment of a ‘Mentor-Mentee relationship’ with the brass band of the South Sudanese village of Tonj. The band is visiting Korea as part of the South Sudanese delegation to the KOAFEC (Korea-Africa Economic Cooperation) Ministerial Conference.

Their Mentors, comprising 30 Korea Eximbank staff including Chairman Yong Hwan Kim, will regularly send scholarship money and keep up correspondence with their Mentees.

The brass band from the South Sudanese village of Tonj was established by the late Father Tae Seok Lee* to heal the wounds of war and poverty inflicted on the country through music.

* Tae Seok Lee was a Catholic priest who was ordained after graduating medical school and subsequently devoted his life to founding a school and a hospital in the village of Tonj, South Sudan. He passed away of cancer in 2010.

Chairman Kim, who volunteered to be the band’s first Mentor, remarked, “We will do our utmost to turn the Smile Tonj project into a landmark of Korean aid, in order to uphold the spirit of love and sharing personified by Father Lee. I hope that our Mentees will return to their village with warm and beautiful memories of Father Lee’s country.”

The Tonj brass band has had a busy schedule during their stay in Korea.

On October 15, the band played the ‘Arirang’ and the ‘Spring of the Hometown’ at the opening ceremony of the KOAFEC Conference. On the next day, the band visited the Everland theme park in Yongin and had a great time with the staff from Korea Eximbank.

On October 17, the band is scheduled to sign a sisterhood agreement with Baemoon Middle School in Seoul and perform in the KBS Open Concert.

On October 20, the band will depart for South Sudan after visiting the National Museum.

Korea Eximbank has been working together with the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the government of South Sudan and the Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) to spread the late Father Lee’s noble spirit of love and sharing through the ‘Smile Tonj’ project since January.

This project is a private-public partnership scheme aiming to build the first-ever university hospital in South Sudan, in the war-torn capital city of Juva, through aid in loans and grants; and to build a health center and a small school in the village of Tonj with money collected through a national fundraiser in Korea.