Third World Bloc Thwarts U.N. Reform Plan 
By Warren Hoge
April 29, 2006
The New York Times
Original Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/29/world/29nations.html

UNITED NATIONS, April 28 — The group representing nations from the developing world succeeded Friday in stalling and possibly scuttling Secretary General Kofi Annan's plan for overhauling the management of the United Nations.
A vote in the powerful budgeting committee of the General Assembly on Mr. Annan's proposal exposed the deep divisions between wealthy and poor nations over the issue and provoked predictions from a number of ambassadors of damaging consequences for the entire organization.
It also effectively halted progress on management reform proposals that were a centerpiece of Mr. Annan's program for his final year in office and served as a response to the criticism the United Nations faced after the scandal surrounding the Iraqi oil-for-food program.
By a vote of 108 to 50, with three abstentions, the budgeting committee approved a resolution offered by South Africa in the name of the developing nations' association, the Group of 77, which has grown to 132 members, and China. The resolution in effect rejected or delayed major parts of Mr. Annan's plan, which had been submitted to the committee for review in March with an April 18 deadline of reporting to the full General Assembly. 
Ambassadors also protested the fact that the leader of the Group of 77's effort, Dumisani Kumalo of South Africa, had provoked the vote in a committee that traditionally settles its arguments by consensus.
I fear there will be no winners in this vote, and if there are losers, it is reform of the organization, said Kenzo Oshima, the Japanese ambassador. It is likely to be interpreted as rejection or at best deferral of these necessary reforms. 
Gerhard Pfanzelter, the Austrian ambassador and a spokesman for the European Union, who failed in a last-minute move to broker a compromise, said: We are worried that it will polarize the membership of the United Nations on this important question of management reform. This is not in the interest of the European Union and cannot be in the interest of any member state.
The vote on Friday produces a delay in considering Mr. Annan's plan that is likely to provoke a potentially larger conflict in June when the United Nations must establish its budget. 
Under an arrangement put forward by the United States, member nations agreed under pressure in December to tie the budgeting for the second half of this year to achievement of changes in management.
Theoretically, the rich nations could withhold the $950 million needed to pay salaries after June 30, though John R. Bolton, the American ambassador, has insisted that he did not intend to prevent the organization from functioning. 
In the background of the debate was the threat that some rich countries might cite the failure to rein in the bureaucracy of the United Nations as reason to begin reducing their dues, which represent the bulk of financing for the organization. The two largest contributors are the United States, which provides 22 percent of the budget, and Japan, which accounts for 19.5 percent.
Mr. Bolton made no mention of that possibility on Friday, saying only, Absent top-to-bottom management reform, the United Nations will continue to be ill-equipped to meet the current demands that we as member states place upon the organization.
Since he arrived at the United Nations in August, however, Mr. Bolton has frequently referred to widespread misgivings about the organization in the United States Congress. A bill that would withhold dues if specific reform proposals were not carried out passed the House last year.
On Thursday, after the second of three contentious committee meetings, Mr. Bolton said the vote would have ramifications in Washington.
If the American public and Congress can see what actually goes on up here as opposed to the confusion and fog that often accompanies debates at the United Nations, then they'll be in a position to draw their conclusions, he said. That's what happens in a democratic system, you lay all this out for the sun to shine in and then people can react.
In the committee debate Mr. Kumalo complained that Mr. Annan's proposals took authority from the 191-member General Assembly, where poorer nations feel they are represented, and transferred it to the 15-member Security Council and the office of the secretary general where, in his group's view, rich countries hold sway.
In particular, he said, the developing nations objected to what they saw as a move to give large contributors more power than smaller ones.
We believe in the Group of 77 and China in the right of every member state to have an equal say in the decision making of this organization, Mr. Kumalo said. This right for us is not dependent on the financial contributions of member states to the budget of this organization.
In an action that could make them unwitting allies of critics who contend the United Nations is incapable of being reformed, the developing nations pushed for passage of the measure under the committee's traditional procedure of approval by consensus, even in the knowledge that 45 nations had signed a document saying they were opposed to it.
At issue in Mr. Annan's plan was how much control the secretary general would have over reallocating jobs and money without approval from the budgeting committee.
The plan called for more financial oversight, modernized hiring, firing and recruiting procedures, career planning, a onetime staff buyout, modernized communications and technology and flexibility in assigning staff and resources.