Inga-Britt Ahlenius
Under-Secretary-General for Oversight Services
After seven years with the United Nations, of which I served five as the Under-Secretary- General for Internal Oversight Services (USG/OIOS), I now leave the United Nations, proud of the opportunity given to me to serve this precious Organization in important positions. Being Swedish adds to that feeling of pride. Dag Hammarskjöld saw working in the United Nations – whether as its Secretary-General or as a common staff member - as serving the world community, which is a privilege.
I have great appreciation for the dedicated and professional staff of OIOS. I leave with the rewards of having worked with talented people from all over the world. To the very last day I have looked around me in a conference room and noted with wonder the diversity at the United Nations: for example, that in the room we were fifteen people from twelve different countries. What a privilege! In OIOS alone, we are some 70 different nationalities.
I am proud to report to you the achievements by OIOS during the last five years, bringing the OIOS to be “a world class oversight body respected and trusted by stakeholders” in accordance with OIOS agreed Vision Statement. The visible sign of our commitment to quality in our work is the manuals for the three disciplines - audit, evaluation, investigation - published on our website in the interest of transparency. The publication also serves the purpose of making known to everybody our commitments to process and quality in our work. Please find attached a separate more detailed report on our achievements and a list of the different documents that we have submitted to you to advise you in accordance with OIOS mandate. (Attach 1 and 2) Whether the world is a better place now than five years ago and whether the United Nations has contributed in a positive way is finally for others to assess. I would restrict myself to discussing and reflecting on the question:
The United Nations is a unique organization. As such it attracts young, talented people from all over the world, because it is a great organiz in. Our mission is uniquely critical to world peace and security, and our Charter is the greatest cause to commit to. The United Nations’ mandate leads us to operate under exceptional circumstances - civil war, natural catastrophes, failed crops and starvation, civil unrest.
Our operational environment also implies lack of basic infrastructure, including communication, housing and other basic facilities. Ris is in the DNA of our operations, and the Secretariat must at all times be prepared to deliver and render account of its performance.
The United Nations is as indispensable as it is imperfect – it is complex, risk exposed with a challenging governance structure. Notwithstanding, to keep its legitimacy and to efficiently contribute to the programmatic aims of the Organization it must strive for and be seen striving for its own reform and increased effectiveness. If it fails, it may not only lose its legitimacy and the respect from member States but finally the programmatic aims of the Organization may be jeopardized: the United Nat t be seen as a credible and strong partner, to make a difference through its existence and contributions.
The Secretariat is an organization with a demanding mandate. It is also an international bureaucracy with its special and inherent shortcomings: rigidities and rules tend to substitute for management and leadership. To bring about change is a challenge. National administrations are under pressure from different balancing powers to reform and progress – independent judiciary and oversight bodies, citizens electing their parliaments, opposition parties, media - as forces to modernize, reform and move forward. Such balancing powers are lacking in an international bureaucracy and must be compensated by professional and strong leadership to ensure progress and reform. Weak leadership exposes the Secretariat to the risk of finally reforming through crises or external chocks. On top of its demanding mandate, the United Nations has an extremely complex governance structure. It is a value driven organization with 192 members on the Governing Board, the General Assembly. It is not a simple profit driven company where the bottom-line is the answer to its performance but a complex service provider in world wide operations and where performance is not easily measured.
It has been called “the world’s most impossible job". It is not - but it is certainly one of the most difficult ones, a Herculean management task. retary-General must be prepared to engage in issues where he believes he can make a difference, exercising that moral authority that the Charter gives him. The position also takes unusual commitment, persistence, perseverance, patience - because finally all 192 Member States will have to be on board in the way forward. I could add a fourth P-word – Passion. To lead the Organization, you have to love it; you have to have passion for it. Exceptional leadership is required - strong, charismatic, enlightened leadership.
No Member State, no–one expects the Secretary-General or the United Nations to solve all the problems in the world. What is expected from the Secretary-General and the United Nations is that the Organization has such a standing that it is seen as and really constitutes a relevant and even a necessary partner in solving complex issues in the world, issues that otherwise would not be addressed. The organization is established to serve the world community and must be properly organized and led in order to be that relevant partner for the Member States.
The Secretary-General is foremost the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), in charge of the Secretariat. This is in fact the only role explicitly mentioned in the Charter (Article 97 of the United Nations Charter). In this capacity - the internal management role - he serves and is accountable to the General Assembly. (You are interestingly enough also quoted from your period as the Chief of Staff to the then President of the GA, saying that “The Secretariat belongs to us – the Member States - and we have hired the Secretary-General to run it!)
But the Secretary-General has also an important right of initiative vis-à-vis the Security Council (Article 99 of the Charter) - the external and more political role: “The Secretary-General may bring to the attention of the Security Council any
matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security” These two roles - the external and internal - are not necessarily conflicting. Rather they may be seen as complementary. There is a balance to strike between them in the sense that a well managed secretariat may be seen as a prerequisite for Member States’ confidence and willingness to see the United Nations as a strong and reliable partner, an institution that may make a difference while addressing problems in the world.
As to the external and more political role vis-à-vis the Security Council, the General Assembly may have different views on how active and proactive they expect the Secretary-General to be. There is an inbuilt conflict in the sense that the big powers, read the Permanent Members of the Security Council, the P5, w the United Nations and the Secretary-General as a force to potentially reduce their influence on world affairs, while other and small countries would rather view the United Nations and its Secretary- General as a potential increase of their possible influence. It is certainly a challenge for the Secretary-General to find his way through these potentially conflicting interests and to make a positive difference in the world - championing the core objectives of the United Nations: to maintain peace and security, to fight for human rights and for social and economic progress.
The Secretary-General has a balance to strike: to find the right position between being seen as "too strong" and being "weak" to be just right to maintain and uphold the relevance of the Organization. A Secretary-General that is seen as "too strong" will certainly receive signals by Member States that will bring him back to "balance". A situation with a weak Secretary-General is more difficult, more subtle. It will take time to see that the balance is lost. There will probably be no early signals from Member States who might not see any "problem", but rather see the situation as comfortable, the Secretary-General being seen as "harmless", pragmatically accommodating and therefore seen as convenient to Member States.
It will take time to see the harm caused by the weak Secretary-General because the process of decay and weakening of the Organization and the Secretariat is a stealthy process: senior positions politicized, a culture that will filter down in the organization, compromising the merit based recruitment, undermining excellence and lowering the moral; the health and capacity of the Secretariat will be ignored: stress on structured reforms will cease, resistance will be weak to initiat oment. Such a process may go relatively fast - a couple of years only - and is difficult to restore. The final result is the weakening of the standing of the organization to the effect that it loses its capacity and its relevance to constitute that necessary partner for Member States.
Therefore: maybe even more concerning for Member States - and certainly for the world community - than a strong Secretary-General is a weak Secretary-General. Boutros Boutros-Ghali established the intellectual leadership of the Secretariat. Kofi Annan reconfirmed the role of the Secretary-General as both the “norm-entrepreneur” of the world and his role as the pre-eminent diplomat and chief negotiator. Dag Hammarskjöld was the one who defined the role of the Secretary-General and he pronounced himself often on the two roles. He maintained that “the Charter gives the
Secretary-General an explicit political role.” His active and successful intervention in international crises was the demonstration of this conviction. But his activist interpretation in this respect also brought him into conflict with the super-powers. I have often quoted him:
He regarded himself above all as an international civil servant and the leader of the Secretariat - the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO). Having served as the Under- Secretary in the Swedish Ministry of Finance, it was not surprising that he like no-one else after him ventured into the process of reforming and restructuring the Secretariat. He reportedly “supervised an in-depth study, chaired many of the working groups set up on various administrative, personnel and financial issues, and wrote numerous papers spelling out his analysis of the problems and potential solutions.“. As the CAO he was not only reforming, reorganizing, restructuring, he was also relentlessly stressing the role and importance of the Secretariat and its staff, the importance of a truly international Secretariat with integrity and faithfulness to the Charter. Metaphorically speaking he was on the scene daily conveying this message – in his annual reports, in speeches on Staff Days, in external seminars and interventions. His moral authority gave the moral authority to his office, the United Nations.
In his last speech to staff in September 1961, a few days before his death, he re-affirmed his conviction that:
“If the Secretariat is regarded as truly international, and its individual members as owing no allegiance to any national government, then the Secretariat may develop as an instrument for the preservation of peace and security of increasing significance and responsibilities.”
Boutros Boutros-Ghali, originally a professor of law at Cairo University, is described to have exercised an “intellectual leadership”. As the CAO his remaining cy is the establishment of the Office of Internal Oversight Serv ). The Office was established with the specific purpose to assist the Secretary-General in his oversight responsibilities of the secretariat. It was established as “operationally independent” and in an Administrative Instruction related to the founding resolution, Boutros-Ghali ensured that the operational independence of the office was logically followed up by delegating to the USG/OIOS the authority to appoint staff within OIOS with an authority “similar to those delegated by the Secretary-General to the heads of programmes, funds and subsidiary organs enjoying special status in these matters”.
Thereby, he had ensured himself - or at least his successors - a strong capacity and partner to assist him in the challenging task of being the CAO, to lead the Secretariat. “..in fulfilling his internal oversight responsibilities in respect of the resources and staff of the organization….” (General Assembly resolution 48/218B)
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