 |
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon carries a girl at a children rehabilitation centre in Moscow, while visiting a United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) project for sick children as part of his official visit to Russia, April 21, 2011. - REUTERS |
by Dr. Ruwantissa Abeyratne
(May 04,Montreal, Sri Lanka Guardian) The Secretary General of the United Nations is the executive head of the United Nations – a highly diverse organization working worldwide to improve the lives, living standards and health of those needing help. He/she is appointed by the General Assembly upon recommendation of the Security Council. This is provided for by Article 97 of the United Nations Charter which also stipulates that the UN Secretariat shall comprise a Secretary–General and such staff as the Organization may require and that the Secretary-General shall be the chief administrative officer of the Organization. The Secretariat is comprised of some 8,700 regular civilian staff members in the UN Headquarters in New York as well as around the world in UN offices, all of whom report to the Secretary General. The overall staff strength of the United Nations would rise to approximately 50,000 if the specialized agencies of the United Nations and the financial institutions based in Washington D.C. such as the World Bank are to be taken into consideration. The Secretary General overseas a $ 5 billion peacekeeping budget which sustains over 80,000 peacekeepers worldwide.
The Secretary General (and his staff) are granted a number of privileges and immunities, including exemption from national service obligations, immunity from lawsuits for acts performed in an official capacity and exemption from direct taxes on salaries and emoluments. The Secretary General is assisted by the Deputy Secretary General and several Under Secretaries General, special envoys and assistant Secretaries General in that order. The Secretary General and his immediate assistants are elevated to the same level as diplomatic envoys.
The Secretary-General could serve for one or two terms of five years each. Traditionally the Secretary-General cannot be a national of any of the permanent Security Council nations. The post loosely follows a cycle in which each successive Secretary-General comes from a different continent. The current Secretary-General is Ban Ki-Moon of South Korea who is the eighth Secretary General. His appointment began on January 1 2007.
Shortly after taking office, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s predecessor in office, Kofi Annan presented a sweeping reform package aimed at helping the United Nations to change with the times and adapt to a new era of global affairs. Reform measures falling under the authority of the Secretary-General had been largely implemented or set in motion; they had been administrative -- such as a zero-growth budget and rigorous efforts to upgrade management practices -- as well as organizational, with the emphasis on enabling the Organization to respond more effectively to the growing demands placed on it, particularly in the areas of development and peacekeeping.
One of the most vital roles played by the Secretary-General is the use of his "good offices" -- steps taken publicly and in private, drawing upon his independence, impartiality and integrity, to prevent international disputes from arising, escalating or spreading. Since becoming Secretary-General, Mr. Annan made use of his good offices in a range of situations, involving among other nations Cyprus, East Timor, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria and Western Sahara.
The position of Secretary General is, by unwritten convention, expected to rotate by geographic region. When Annan had finished his first term, the member states were so impressed with his performance that he was appointed for a second term despite a general feeling that the next Secretary-General should have been from Asia. There has not yet been a Secretary-General from North America, Eastern Europe or Oceana.
The Secretary-General ultimately appointed is usually a candidate considered consensually acceptable to the Security Council and is therefore recommended by the Security Council to the General Assembly. Any candidate would not be appointed if there were to be even a single veto against him or her from a member of the Security Council. Usually, the successful candidate is from a middle power who has little or no claim to prior fame. Although high-profile candidates are often mentioned as worthy of the job, they are almost always rejected as unacceptable to some. For instance, figures like Charles de Gaulle, Dwight Eisenhower and Anthony Eden were considered for the first Secretary-General position, but were rejected in favour of the uncontroversial Norwegian Trygve Lie. It is felt that owing to the vagaries of international politics and intrigues of political compromise, there are many similarities between the process and ideals for selecting the Secretary-General and those of selecting leading figures in other international organizations.
It was originally felt that the role of the Secretary-General should be purely administrative. This trend was changed by the first Secretary-General Trygve Lie who asserted that it behoved the Secretary General to speak out and act as leader and mediator.. Each of his successors, following this approach, has spoken out on global issues and used the good offices of the Secretary General to mediate disputes. This is consistent with the original vision of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who held office just before the creation of the UN and had much influence on its shaping, that the organization should be headed by a "world moderator
In addition to managing staff and administering them, the Secretary-General plays a key role in mediation between States, negotiating between warring parties and deploying UN sponsored peace keeping forces. The Secretary-General also appoints special envoys and personal representatives who undertake missions in difficult areas. By March 2006 there were no less than 60 such special envoys.
The Secretary General who is in equal parts diplomat, advocate, civil servant and CEO, remains the bulwark of United Nations ideals and a spokesman for the welfare and interests of the people of the world. Much the Secretary General’s focus on the poor, the downtrodden and vulnerable.
The Secretary-General’s day to day tasks include attendance at sessions of United Nations bodies; consultations with world leaders, government officials, and others; and worldwide travel intended to keep him in touch with the peoples of the Organization's Member States and informed about the vast array of issues of international concern that are on the Organization's agenda. Each year, the Secretary-General issues a report on the work of the United Nations that appraises its activities and outlines future priorities. The Secretary-General is also Chairman of the Administrative Committee on Coordination (ACC), which brings together the Executive Heads of all UN funds, programmes and specialized agencies twice a year in order to further coordination and cooperation in the entire range of substantive and management issues facing the United Nations System.
One of the empowering provisions in the United Nations Charter which assigns a signal role to the Secretary-General is Article 99 which enables the Secretary-General to bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter which in his/her opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security. Notable examples of instances when this Article was used relate to the Congo, when Dag Hammarskjold cautioned the Security Council, followed by Trygve Lie in Korea and Kurt Waldheim in Iran. Although this provision has not been frequently used, the Secretary-General can, without invoking the provision, exert his influence behind the scenes with the States, in particular the powers in the Security Council. The eight Secretaries General who have so far been at the helm during the United Nations’ 60 years of existence have demonstrated that their personal judgment, initiative and risk taking ability are the defining qualities of a Secretary-General.
The Secretary General is subject to continued scrutiny and criticism of States. For example, Secretary General U Thant was held accountable and was stringently criticized for pulling out troops from the Sinai in 1967. Similarly, both Secretaries General Lie and Hammarskjold were criticized by the Soviet bloc for the actions taken in Korea and the Congo respectively. In more recent years Secretary-General Perez de Cuellar was criticized for his role in the Persian Gulf as well as Boutros-Ghali regarding Bosnia, and Kofi Annan with regard to the UN role in Somalia and Iraq. Criticism is an integral corollary of the job, although through the years, the Secretary General has not come out with a harsh judgment that would reflect his partisanship which in turn would result in the loss of his credibility and confidence of powerful and important States.
One of the official duties of the Secretary General is to manage the budget of the United Nations which is comprised of contributions from member States. Both estimated incomes and estimated expenditures are laid down in the Organization’s budget by the various administrative organs of the UN. The Secretary General compiles these various proposals and sends them to several advisory bodies for their views and revisions after which the document passes on to the Plenary. The budget is of critical importance to the Secretary General as the availability of funds and resources could well contribute to timely action on the part of the UN in crisis situations where, often the complaint is made that the UN does not deliver what it promises.
The seminal characteristic of the office of the Secretary General lies in its neutrality and the lack of vested interests. The Secretary General does not, under any circumstance “enforce” but rather overseas the facilitation of administration in States that need such support after collapsing or succumbing to natural or man made disasters and wars.
Neither the Secretary General nor the staff of the United Nations Secretariat and other offices are allowed to seek or follow instructions from any government or State. They are international civil servants driven by their own impartiality and independence. The UN Charter, under Article 96 allows only the General Assembly and the Security Council to seek an advisory opinion from the judicial organ of the UN, the International Court of Justice. The office of the Secretary General has in the past sought a mandate to request such opinions from the ICJ under this provision, on the ground that an opinion from the world court, when solicited by the head of the UN and delivered, would assist him in defining legitimate positions of the international community in situations that present a threat to world peace.
The issue of human rights has been paramount under both the Annan and ki-Moon administrations. It is noteworthy that until Secretary General Annan took over as head of the UN there was not much emphasis on human rights. Therefore, Secretary General Annan’s commitment and dedication to human rights have effectively percolated to his successor as an inheritance that comes with the job.
The question arises as to whether the General assembly, which appoints the Secretary General, can interfere or affect the functions of the Secretary General. The answer seems to lie in the opinion delivered by the International Court of Justice with regard to the creation of the United Nations Administrative Tribunal (UNAT). When the UNAT was created by the General Assembly in the 1940s as a court to hear disputes between the UN staff and the Secretary General, and the UNAT started handing down judgments that required the Secretary General to pay compensation to aggrieved staff, the Secretary General requested the General Assembly for a separate budgetary allotment to pay the awards. The General Assembly refused this request stating that the Assembly was not bound by the judgments of the UNAT. One of the arguments placed before the International Court of Justice was that by creating the UNAT the General Assembly interfered with the powers and functions of the Secretary General. The ICJ rejected this argument, stating that the General Assembly, by virtue of Article 101 of the UN Charter, had powers to establish staff rules for the UN staff and therefore had the power to interfere with the Secretary General’s work.
What faces the Secretary General in the 21st Century? To answer this question, one has to start with Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s vision of “the three pillars” around which we need to reorganise today’s United Nations to give it focus, to reconnect it and make it more relevant to its core constituents: the peoples of the world… development, security and human rights and democracy.” Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has pledged to lead by example; seek excellence with humility; set the highest ethical standard; pursue dialogue and engagement; play the role of harmonizer and bridge-builder; make transparency and accountability the cornerstone of my tenure; be animated by both passion and compassion in achieving our goals; and be sensitive to the concerns of all Member States, big and small. On peace the Secretary General says: “We must strengthen the UN's ability to play its role to the fullest extent in conflict prevention, peacemaking, peacekeeping and peacebuilding – these are all part of a continuum, and our approach must be integrated, coordinated and comprehensive. By enhancing our capacity for preventive diplomacy and supporting sustainable peace processes, we will build long-term solutions and respond more effectively to conflict”.
Prevention of armed conflict, and mending fences after an armed conflict that cannot be prevented are major issues for the Secretary General. Armed conflict remains the primary source of instability today and is therefore incontrovertibly the main concern of the United Nations. There is no room for doubt that responsibility for the prevention of armed conflict lies with the States themselves. However, this does not absolve the United Nations of all responsibility, particularly as most conflicts today occur within States and the United Nations has the capacity to assist States in adopting preventive measures. Also, arguably, the most serious current threat to humankind is the use of nuclear weapons. The threat is further exacerbated by the fact that materials and technology used to produce nuclear weapons may be increasingly passing on to the hands of non-State parties, including terrorist organizations. In this context, the United Nations and its member nations cannot entirely rule out the possibility of a large scale use of nuclear weapons. This perhaps is the most daunting prospect for the next Secretary General.
Given the unpredictability of the world, one of the greatest challenges faced by today’s leadership is not so much the dilemma to choose between the alternative of making and not making, but of unmaking. As the old fable goes, the great Saturn, growing weary of sitting alone, and with no one but Heaven and Uranus watching him, created an oyster, and repeated this act several times, bringing forth a race of oysters. Watching this monotonous reluctance of Saturn’s conservatism, Uranus cried out, “ a new work, O Saturn! The old is not good again” , to which Saturn replied that he feared he shall not do, but undo, and therefore he kept to safe acts. Later, Saturn thought, and thought, and the words of Uranus came to him like a burning ray of the Sun, and he created Jupiter. After that Saturn lapsed into his usual sloth and fear, and the world froze. To save the world, Jupiter slay his father, Saturn.
Post a Comment