Turning around the UN 

Alexander Casella
December 22, 2006
International Herald Tribune
Original Source: http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/12/22/opinion/edcasella.php

When Ban Ki Moon assumes his functions as secretary general of the United Nations on Jan. 1, 2007 he will be taking over an organization that in its 50-year history has never achieved such a high level of visibility — and, in the words of one of its senior officials, has never been in a worse situation both administratively and politically.
At the top of the list of the UN's problems, the oil- for-food program in Iraq may have been the biggest corruption scam in history and unaccounted funds still run into the billions of dollars. And while governments share part of the blame, ultimate responsibility rests with the UN secretariat that managed the project.
The bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad on Aug. 19, 2003, could not have been totally avoided but the massive casualties among UN staff members could certainly have been circumscribed had a minimum number of basic security precautions been taken by a UN system that Martti Ahtisaari, a former Finnish president and an old friend of the UN, qualified as dysfunctional.
East Timor, once presented as the UN's greatest nation-building success, was at best a partial failure.
As for the much-advertised UN reform process, no concrete results materialized and the few proposals that emerged were roundly turned down by the General Assembly.
These deficiencies reveal an organization that is at best second-rate. Redressing it will be Ban's major challenge.
The weak link of the UN system is the secretariat, the 8,000-strong bureaucracy that is tasked with implementing the decisions taken by the Security Council and the General Assembly. Oil-for-food, the security lapses in Baghdad and a lackadaisical approach to charges of sexual harassment were all failures of the secretariat, a behemoth kept alive by a handful of dedicated staff members battling daily in a labyrinth of inane regulations against a system where inertia reigns supreme, cronyism is the rule and overstaffing a way of life.
The secretary general currently has a cabinet of 31 senior managers in addition to 85 special representatives and advisers. This assemblage includes a special adviser for Africa and a special advisor for special assignments in Africa, a special representative for Iraq, a special adviser for Iraq and a high-level coordinator for Iraq.
These figures do not include an undisclosed bevy of one-dollar-a-year consultants, mostly former senior UN staff, who are provided with diplomatic status which enables them to avoid paying income tax. It will be up to Ban to determine whether they serve any real purpose.
Changing the secretariat into a lean, responsible and performance-oriented organization will also require a lucid reappraisal of the role of the secretary general.
The UN charter describes the secretary general as the chief administrative officer of the organization. His core function is thus to administer the secretariat.
The news media will humor a secretary general who defines himself as the spokesman for the poor, the embodiment of the principals of the UN or the holder of a sacred mission to promote peace. But in times of crisis, when governments feel that their interests are at stake and push comes to shove, the secretary general's pronouncements may have no bearing on what is at issue. And the current deification of the position has ultimately revealed its lack of real influence.
Ban's mission will be to restore a sense of reality to an office that has sometimes seemed to have little grounding in the real world. In doing so he will be well served by his many years in government, which will have made him particularly sensitive to what member states expect from an organization that they have created and that they fund.
Ban will need common sense, political acumen and a moral compass. UN rules provide that all senior staff, with the exception of the secretary general, disclose their assets. It is to Ban's credit that in one of his first statements he announced that come Jan. 1 he will elect to do so — a small step but a significant one on the road to restoring the credibility of an organization for which there is no substitute.