Epitome of decency
Annan’s legacy of fighting for equality and rights lives on.
GHANA-born Kofi Annan, who died Saturday aged 80, was the first UN chief from sub-Saharan Africa, and it was on this continent that he experienced both the most difficult moment of his career, as well as some of his biggest diplomatic successes.
Annan left the United Nations far more committed than it had been to combating poverty, promoting equality and fighting for human rights – and until his death Saturday he was speaking out strongly for nations working together to solve problems and worried about the rise of nationalism.
As secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006, Annan saw as his greatest achievements the programmes and policies he put in place to reduce inequality within and between countries, to combat infectious diseases and to promote human rights and protect civilians from war crimes including genocide.
He launched the UN Millennium Development Goals at a summit of world leaders in 2000 to cut extreme poverty by half, promote equality for women, ensure every child has a primary school education, reduce maternal and child mortality, and halt the spread of AIDS – all by 2015.
Those goals – only a few of which were fully achieved – were succeeded by an expanded list of UN Sustainable Development Goals for 2030 that adds issues such as climate action, affordable and clean energy, and promoting peace and justice. The updated list is a major focus of the UN’s current agenda.
In Switzerland in 2007, Annan founded the Kofi Annan Foundation, reported dpa, which works to promote democracy and mediate in crisis situations. He also advocated modernising agriculture in Africa as the key to a better future.
Although he had never returned to his hometown of Ghana as an adult for an extended period, his heart and his mind often turned toward his homeland and the African continent. Annan said Africa’s growth could double and poverty could be drastically reduced if governance across various countries improved.
Annan’s first name is not uncommon in Ghana, where Kofi simply means “Friday” in the local language of Akan. Kofi Atta Annan was born on April 8, 1938 – a Friday – in Kumasi, when his West African homeland was still the British colony Gold Coast.
AFP reported that like a whole generation of officials, diplomats and foreign ministers, Annan was forever scarred by the failure of the international community to foresee and prevent the 1994 Rwandan genocide, where, according to UN figures, 800,000 people died, largely Tutsi.
Annan was 56 and just one year into his term as deputy secretary general in charge of peacekeeping operations when the deadly machetes rained down on Rwanda’s Tutsi and moderate Hutus.
Under the military command of Canadian general Romeo Daillaire, the UN’s Minuar peacekeeping mission was deployed in Rwanda when the genocide began. But it failed to prevent the massacre, as a result of a lack of reinforcements, the deployment of which needed a Security Council vote.
As the killing spread, the number of Minuar peacekeepers was even reduced.
On several occasions after the genocide, Annan acknowledged that his actions had not been sufficient to prevent the massacres.
“The international community failed Rwanda and that must leave us always with a sense of bitter regret,” Annan said on the 10th anniversary of the genocide.
As UN peacekeeping chief just before becoming secretary-general, AP reported that Annan shared blame for the failure of UN troops he deployed to prevent the genocides in Rwanda in 1994 and in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in July 1995.
When he became UN chief, Annan launched a doctrine of “humanitarian intervention” to prevent governments and leaders from massacring their own people. At a summit in 2005, over objections from some countries, 191 nations endorsed what has become known as the “responsibility to protect” civilians and head off the world’s worst crimes, from ethnic cleansing to genocide. This doctrine is frequently cited – but to the dismay of UN officials, not often implemented.
At the end of 2006, one month before stepping down as UN Secretary General after 10 years in office, Annan promised never to forget Africa.
Annan also saw as a major achievement the expansion of the UN’s work into partnerships with businesses, foundations, universities and civil society.
This led, for example, to the establishment of the Global Compact in 2001 where Annan asked corporate leaders to publicly commit to 10 principles in the areas of human rights, labour, the environment and anti-corruption. More than 9,000 of the world’s leading CEOs have joined the compact, which continues to attract new members, and “corporate responsibility” has become a key feature of the business world.
When Annan handed the reins of the UN to Ban Ki-moon, he said he would keep working on African issues, human rights, global warming and governance issues, and speak out from time to time when necessary. He told one farewell party: “You can take the man out of the UN, but you can’t take the UN out of the man.”
Only last month, Annan was tweeting about his concerns with the current state of the world.
“No nation can make itself secure by seeking supremacy over all others. We all share responsibility for each other’s #security, and only by working to make each other secure can we hope to achieve lasting security for ourselves,” he said in a July 3 tweet that appeared aimed at the United States.
And on July 30, he tweeted: “Whether our task is fighting #poverty, stemming the spread of #disease or saving innocent lives from mass murder, we have seen that we cannot succeed without the #leadership of the strong and the engagement of all.”
Annan believed in quiet, behind-the-scenes diplomacy but wasn’t afraid to speak out when he thought necessary. He mentored a generation of UN officials including current SecretaryGeneral Antonio Guterres and outgoing UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein.
The Jordanian diplomat said in a statement he once told Annan how everyone was criticising him, and the former UN chief responded: “You’re doing the right thing. Let them grumble.”
“Kofi was humanity’s best example, the epitome of human decency and grace. In a world now filled with leaders who are anything but that, our loss, the world’s loss, becomes even more painful,” Zeid said. – Agencies