On Thursday, the United Nations (UN) Security Council’s 15 members held the first straw poll that kick-started the selection process of the 10th Secretary General of the global intergovernmental organisation. The seven nominees, who have queued up to replace António Guterres in the top position when his tenure ends on December 31, 2026, were hierarchised by the non-binding straw poll that bears some surface-level similarities with a papal conclave. Conducted behind closed doors and with sequential ballots whose results apply pressure on non-viable candidates to drop out, Thursday’s straw poll-per the Security Council’s July president, Zenon Mukongo Ngay from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)-returned no clear winner.
It might be early days yet, but after Security Council members indicated whether they encourage, discourage, or express no opinion on each candidate of the seven nominees, Ugandan diplomat Olara Otunnu brought up the rear. Records show that Mr Otunnu polled two encourage, five discourage, and eight no opinion ballots. Fascinatingly, Mr Otunnu is considered the inventor of the straw poll. While serving as the Security Council President, he mooted the idea after an ideological clash between Washington and Beijing threatened to deadlock an election in 1981.
The idea, a key cog of what has come to be known as the Otunnu Formula, is expected to take precedence over other nuggets as Mr Otunnu moves around his résumé in the coming days before a second straw poll is conducted under Denmark’s presidency. ‘We are making arrangements to see to it that he gets his engagement with the president of the UN Security Council as well as the president of the General Assembly as fast as possible because the other candidates have indeed appeared before them,’ Mr Vincent Bagiire, the permanent secretary (PS) at Uganda’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), told a media briefing this week.
Getting behind Otunnu
Kampala has wholly thrown its weight behind Mr Otunnu’s candidature, saying that his late entry to the race does not mean that he cannot be credentialed as a favourite for the job. With support from the Council’s five veto-wielding permanent members-China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States -seen as vital, Kampala is hoping that Mr Otunnu’s résumé will put in a good word for him. ‘At a tender age of 31… he was the president of the UN Security Council and that is a very important organ,’ Mr Bagiire noted this week. The election of a new UN Secretary General comes at a time when observers say the intergovernmental organisation is unimaginative and lacking in fresh ideas. ‘We need a Secretary General that is going to reform this institution, that is going to make it leaner and more fit for purpose, more relevant on the international stage,’ Mr Mike Waltz, the US ambassador to the United Nations, said after Thursday’s straw poll.
Mr Otunnu, who failed to complete his tenure as Makerere University guild president after learning of president Idi Amin’s plans to have him killed, is both UK- and US-educated. He has worked at the UN in two different capacities-on nomination and at the secretariat. In a 2012 interview with our sister TV station, NTV Uganda, he described this as no mean feat. Speaking this week at a media briefing, the diplomat who turns 76 in September described his candidature as a safe bet.
‘I have a track record, a long track record, of building consensus and of proposing innovative solutions in situations of crisis and deadlock,’ he said. ‘There are very few people who have been able to work as broadly as deeply at the United Nations as myself,’ added the man who as Uganda’s Foreign Affairs minister between the tumultuous period between 1985 and 1986 pulled the strings as the Nairobi Agreement of December 1985 was drafted.
Second bite at the cherry
Not even that spell at Uganda’s MFA smoothened out things to allow him to have a crack at the UN Secretary General job when his name twice came up for mention. ‘There was some major sabotage from Kampala,’ he told NTV Uganda during the 2012 interview. A year earlier, in 2011, he had contested for president but was a no-show on polling day en route to receiving just 1.58 percent of the national vote as Yoweri Museveni won a fourth elective term. Mr Otunnu appears to have since mended fences with Uganda’s long-serving President.
This week, he registered his ‘deep and sincere gratitude’ after President Museveni finally backed his shot at the UN top job. It, however, remains to be seen whether this will be a case of third time lucky. Thursday’s straw poll underscored the scale of work that Mr Otunnu has to do to breathe life into what superficially looks like a flagging campaign.
During Thursday’s straw poll, Rebeca Grynspan of Costa Rica led the way after receiving 10 encourage votes. Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett of Guyana had nine encourage votes and Rafael Mariano Grossi of Argentina secured seven encourages. Other candidates in the race, including former presidents Michelle Bachelet of Chile (half a dozen encourages) and Macky Sall of Senegal (also with six encourages), had lukewarm showings. Ditto María Fernanda Espinosa, the former President of the United Nations General Assembly, who obtained five encourages.
‘It’s early days yet’
Speaking to the Weekend Monitor on Friday, PS Bagiire urged against reading too much into the results of the first straw poll. ‘It is extremely early for a number of reasons. His candidature was declared only recently. The other candidates declared their candidatures early,’ the MFA’s top accounting officer offered, adding, ‘It’s early days. He has not attended the town hall. We are sure that his credentials will speak for themselves.’ PS Bagiire also opined that the discourage votes that all seven candidates received means that no one can lay claim to not having a chink in their armour.
‘The idea is to minimise the discourages,’ he said, ‘Ambassador Otunnu needs to engage the P5 [the five permanent members of the UN Security Council]. None of the P5 has declared that so and so is their candidate.’ The MFA top official reckons that Mr Otunnu’s ‘exceptional’ record of ‘reaching out and building consensus’ will ultimately get him over the proverbial line. ‘We know there are many dynamics and interests for members of the Security Council. Consensus building will be quite crucial,’ he said.
Observers say it will not be until late September or early October that an accurate picture of the true front runner in the race will emerge. A voting process that Mr Otunnu proffered 45 years ago will have been expected to weed out weak contenders without triggering official vetoes. The inventor of the deadlock breaker will expect not to have fallen at his own handiwork. If he doesn’t, a first for Uganda could well and truly beckon.