A Post-mortem on UNESCO Director- General Election

Post-mortems on elections of Director-General of UNESCO are common happenings at UNESCO. There is no harm if observers too engage in post-mortems in order to analyse what goes on at this great organization where world’s civilizations meet, not without trying to civilize each other; or, rather trying to impose one’s own value systems on others.

Post-mortems that take place there are of two kinds. In one kind the results of post-mortems are announced from the rostrum of the General Conference by open supporters or, more often, by ‘king-makers’ who worked for the winning candidates behind the scene. The latter uses the occasion to announce the role he /she played and to shower thanks to the geographical groups and other sub-divisions whom he/she thinks may have supported the candidate.

The situation n is no different from that after a local election in Sri Lanka! In the final analysis, that it is a way of registering one’s role with the expectation of the largesse that often follow the election like posts, consultant status, jobs for kith and kin. which might have been secretly promised. Others who did not work so openly for the winning candidate might congratulate the newly elected Director-General in order not to be left out of the distribution. The list goes on tapering down.

The other kind of post-mortem generally takes place in more secluded conclaves like the meetings of geographical groups but there are ways of making them known to others, as the head of the Arab group, Prof. Haider of Iraq, told me when Sri Lanka’s Permanent Delegate was showering thanks all round on behalf of he winner, Dr.Federico Mayor of Spain In 1987

As I know, the members of the Sri Lankan delegation to the General Conference that year were surprised and embarrassed to witness such a situation soon after the election of the Director General, when Sri Lanka’s own Permanent Delegate without any knowledge of the Head of the Delegation, was the first person to deliver the post-mortem address virtually announcing that he was the person behind Dr. Mayor’s victory. He went on to shower thanks to others whom he thought had supported the winner individually and in geographical groups. Embarrassed leaders of delegations of geographical groups like the Arabs, started coming over to me to ask ‘our man’ to stop the public exposures of support. I was seated at the back of the hall as I was not a member of the Sri Lanka delegation but only an observer as the Ambassador of Sri Lanka in France, and still recognized at UNESCO.

The embarrassment was worse because the Sri Lankan government had decided to support the Pakistani candidate who was the ‘Asian candidate’ on that occasion; and our Permanent Delegate had been tasked as campaign Manager for the Pakistan candidate. He had been selected because he was the head of the Asian/Pacific Group and of G 77 at UNESCO.

This sort of situation is not unusual at UNESCO. Even this time, media reports show that representatives of three African countries were not inclined to vote for the common candidate Mr.Hosny of Egypt and were recalled by their respective governments. In 1987 the Sri Lankan representative escaped such a situation because there were different centres of power in Colombo, and the government took very little notice of what happened at UNESCO. Nor did the Pakistani government make an issue of it with the Sri Lankan government.

What it demonstrates is that these things are not uncommon occurrences at UNESCO. Corruption, nepotism, job/ consultancy prospects including for the progeny, dominate the voting scene at times and representatives act against the decisions of governments. More recent Western media comments accused incumbent Director-General of waste, favouritism, job-distribution, et al, though it was acknowledged that during his two-term tenure he was able to bring U.S. and Singapore back into the organization. Earlier, Director-General Amodu Mahtar M’Bow was similarly accused by Western powers and the U.S. and Singapore withdrew from the organization. This is the situation involved when py-offs are involved.

Sri Lankan Permanent Delegate’s personal role, nevertheless, had its repercussions when Sri Lanka contested the post of Director-General on the previous occasion. The grape-vine became active and there was focus on the role that Sri Lanka had played. The Executive Board rejected the Sri Lankan candidate outright at the first round itself registering two votes only in his favour. In the next round the vote was reduced to a single vote. The candidate did not even get Asian support! Of course, Japanese money spoke on the occasion for the winning candidate. Sri Lanka too wasted much resources to an extent as never seen before, not even when President J.R.J.Jayewardene’s brother contested a post at International Court of Justice !

Voting wisely

It is just as well that this time, at the fifth round of the election sanity prevailed and the members of the Executive Board voted wisely to select the former Bulgarian diplomat and Permanent Delegate to UNESCO Madame Irina Bokova as the next Director-General. She received 8 votes in the first and second round. It does not appear that when the Russian candidate withdrew in the 3rd round the votes that went to him were diverted to Madame Bokova as one might have expected, but they were distributed among the Austrian, Ecuador, and Egyptian candidates.

When Irina Bokova of Bulgaria gained five votes in the 3rd round trailing behind Egypt’s Mr.Hosny who too increased his vote from 22 to 23 and 25 in the first three rounds, it became clear that the fight was going to be between Mr. Hosny and Madame Bokova. In the fourth round both Mr.Hosny and Madame Bokova received an equal number of votes. That also saw the intensification of the anti-Hosny campaign by Jewish and other lobbies. I counted over 250 newspaper articles –there could have been more - in the international press and even a greater number of opinions expressed in the websites against Mr.Hosny. This intensified campaign and the grape- vine pulling out his past negative antecedents like his alleged role in ‘Achille Lauro’ high jacking by the PLO in 1985 while he was Egyptian Cultural Attaché in Rome, really led to a serious review of his would be role as a future Director-General. That also proves my contention about the grape-vine at UNESCO.

There was every indication that the controversy over Mr.Hosny was not going to be compounded after the election if he won. Every prospect was there of old divisions which maligned UNESCO in the 1970s under Mahtar M’Bow re-emerging when the U.S left the organization accusing him of waste, over-emphasis on wasteful programmes for Africa and developing countries. UNESCO faced a serous financial crisis and the withdrawal of the U.S. from the organization also led to the deprivation of other intellectual resources especially in the field of science.

As I said, with Director-General Matsumara’s efforts the U.S. and Singapore have been brought back to UNESCO though his administration has been accused of waste, nepotism and favouritism. There was prospects of old confrontations re-emerging even in a more acute form had Mr.Hosny won the election and even pressure being exerted on the U.S. to withdraw once again. It is to the credit of everyone that such a prospect was avoided.

Madame Bokova comes with long diplomatic experience, also having held the portfolio of Foreign Minister of her country, experience gained at UNESCO and more importantly, inside working of the Executive Board gained through j her former membership there. These points as much as her being the first female to put up a good show, were, in fact, instrumental in her final success though these qualities remained under lower focus at the beginning due to high profile campaigning by Mr.Hosny and his government; and the geographical groups pulling in the direction of their own candidates at the beginning. As I observed in my first article, the election of Madame Bokova fills a lacuna hat existed in respect of Eastern Europe which represents largely, the Slavic cultural group, though in post-USSR situation, the old political cohesion of that region may no longer be present.

The Egyptian government put its entire diplomatic resources at Mr.Hosny’s disposal. Over-campaigning also had its adverse publicity. Some media reports referred to Hosny’s election as a triumph for Culture and the demise of the other disciplines like Science, Education and Communications. That also emphasized the lack of balance in the disciplines possessed by the Egyptian candidate.

It was creditable that Mr.Hosny remained the favourite despite the intensified media campaign against him. The U.S and the West may have been persuaded to support Egypt because of the political consideration that President Mubarak could provide the link for a Middle East settlement but in the final stage these considerations seem to have become less significant and the adverse personality factor in which Mr.Hosny got embroiled alone seem to have decided the issue.

From an overall point of view of UNESCO, Madame Bokovo’s election has to be welcomed. The election by the Executive Board has to be endorsed by the General Conference.

24-09-2009

- Asian Tribune -