Nigerian progress economist and former finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (left) and Amina Mohamed, Kenya’s minister of sports, culture and heritage (right), are among seven candidates for the next Director-General of the World Trade Organization. ( WTO).
Okonjo-Iweala and Mohamed were nominated along with candidates from Egypt, South Korea, Mexico, Moldova and Britain. Applications on July 8.
The Geneva-based organization replaces Brazil’s Roberto Azevedo, who will step down in August, a year before his four-year term ends.
Azevedo’s successor will have to lead the WTO through reforms and negotiations in the face of emerging protectionism, a deep recession through the coronavirus pandemic, and emerging industrial tensions, especially between the U. S. and the U. S. and the U. S. The U. S. and China.
There is ample room to opt for an African candidate and a woman, the appeals after the procedure told Reuters news agency.
No African has been Director-General of the WTO since its creation in 1995, nor has he spearheaded its predecessor, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which began in 1948.
“The Political Batter”
Okonjo-Iweala is a finance specialist and spent 25 years at the World Bank as an economist, culminating in the position of Managing Director.
“Trade is a win-win if done right,” Okonjo-Iweala told DW.
“There is no doubt that Okonjo-Iweala is a force to be reckoned with,” U. S. news outlet Politico reported in June, calling her a “political heavyweight” in an article about her nomination.
Okonjo-Iweala also served as Nigeria’s finance minister twice, from 2003 to 2006 as President Olusegun Obasanjo and from 2011 to 2015 Goodluck Jonathan.
During her tenure as finance minister, Okonjo-Iweala was “recognized for devising reform systems that helped government transparency and stabilized the economy,” according to U. S. business magazine Forbes, which ranked her 48th among the 50 most sensible. “Women” in 2015.
The Harvard-trained economist, who holds a PhD from MIT, served as Nigeria’s foreign minister.
The 66-year-old is on the board of Twitter and Standard Chartered bank, and chairs the board of Gavi, a vaccine alliance.
“I’m interested in the [WTO] position because I’m in the strength of the industry to drive shared prosperity, to improve people’s lives,” Okonjo-Iweala told DW in a Facebook live interview when his appointment was announced.
“Everyone knows that the WTO is going through a difficult time,” he said from Washington, D. C.
“So I’ll take a look to see what reforms members need to have, whether it’s reforms to the dispute agreement formula or updating WTO rules, which will take time,” Okonjo-Iweala said.
Read more: World Trade Organization in trouble: what you want to know
Okonjo-Iweala noted that Africa’s share of global industry is only 3%, whatever she believes she can build if she becomes director-general of the WTO.
“As I go, I will paint for all the members,” Okonjo-Iweala said. But, of course, I am African and I will be interested in making sure that Africa also benefits from all that the WTO has to offer. Surely there is no explanation for why I cannot assure that Africa will also benefit. “
The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) supported Okonjo-Iweala’s candidacy.
Mohamed: diplomat
Kenya’s Minister of Sports, Culture and Heritage, Amina Mohamed, is a lawyer, diplomat and politician with extensive experience in public service domestically and abroad.
“She has been a player in Kenya’s multilateral negotiations in bodies such as the Commonwealth and the World Trade Organization,” according to the e-book Muslim Women in Postcolonial Kenya, which highlighted “her skills in economic and advertising diplomacy. “
Mohamed, who comes from an ethnic Somali family, also served as foreign minister from 2013 to 2018, the first woman to hold the position and the first Muslim woman in Kenya’s cabinet.
Last Friday, he officially admitted the state bar.
The 58-year-old, who speaks English, Russian and Swahili, rose through the ranks of Kenya’s diplomatic service to Kenya’s ambassador to the WTO and, in 2005, was the first woman to chair the WTO’s General Council.
Mohamed is a former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme’s Africa Office in Nairobi.
He received a Master of Laws from Kyiv National University, Ukraine, and a postgraduate degree in International Relations from Oxford University.
Mohamed ran for WTO director-general in 2013, but lost to Azevedo. He was re-elected in 2017 as the only candidate.
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