UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appointed Amat Al Aleem Ali Alsoswa of Yemen as Assistant Secretary-General, Assistant Administrator of UNDP and Director of its Regional Bureau for Arab States.
Alsoswa is currently Minister for Human Rights in Yemen, and has served previously as Yemens ambassador to Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands. From 1997 to 1999, she served as Undersecretary at Yemens Ministry of Information. She will lead 500 UNDP staff covering the 17 country offices in the Arab region, with the 18th office located in the Palestinian Territories.
Alsoswa succeeds Dr. Rima Khalaf Hunaidi, a former deputy prime minister of Jordan, who as director of the UNDP Arab States Bureau since 2000 was responsible for the groundbreaking Arab Human Development Reports. The fourth report in the originally planned four-part series will be published in the spring of 2006.
The intersection of democracy and womens empowerment in the information age has been a focus of Alsoswas career. A longtime proponent of broadening political participation in Yemen, she led the Yemeni Womens Union before joining the Ministry of Information in 1997 to 1999.
In the international arena, she has worked as a consultant to UNDP and its sister agencies, and has published and lectured widely. Alsoswa holds a B.A. in Mass Communications from Cairo University and an M.A. in International Communications from American University in the United States.
In line with the UNDP mandate, the work of the Arab States Bureau has ranged from capacity building to policy formulation within a region that has a wide diversity of needs due to its varied economic bases. In addition, RBAS has taken into consideration the importance of public awareness of development issues in the region.
In recent years, UNDPs National Human Development Reports have become a prominent resource within many Arab countries and in 2002, the first regional Arab Human Development Report was released providing a comparative analysis of the area and highlighting its critical development issues.
Mr. Annan also announced the appointments of Gilbert Houngbo of Togo is the Assistant Secretary-General, Assistant Administrator of UNDP and Director of its Regional Bureau for Africa, and Rebeca Grynspan of Costa Rica as Assistant Secretary-General, Assistant Administrator of UNDP and Director of its Regional Bureau of Latin America and the Caribbean.
Houngbo, who has been serving as UNDPs chief of staff in New York since 2003, will lead 1.500 UNDP staff covering the 45 countries of sub-Saharan Africa. He succeeds Abdoulie Janneh of The Gambia, who in 2006 will start his new job as Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Africa in Addis Ababa. Mr. Janneh had been Director of the UNDP Africa Regional Bureau since 2000.
Prior to his appointment as Chief of Staff, Houngbo served on UNDPs Strategic Management Team and as the organizations Director of Finance and Administration. Houngbo also has extensive private sector experience, having worked at Price Waterhouse Canada, where he specialized in results-focused management of governmental and parastatal entities as well as medium and large scale private companies, in both North America and Africa.
He holds a Maîtrise en Gestion d’Entreprises from the Université de Lomé (Togo), a B.A and DESS (Diplôme dEtudes Supérieures Specialisées) in Accounting and Finance. He is a member of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants.
– Addressing the development challenges facing Africa is our single most critical task, said UNDP Administrator Kemal Dervis adding:
– Gilbert Houngbo combines a lucid focus on results, deep personal integrity and respect for every individual with an abiding commitment and understanding of our mission. With these and other impressive traits, he will lead UNDP’s Regional Bureau for Africa as it works with our partners to trigger growth, trade and human development that will give the African people the power over their lives and the prosperity they deserve.
The Regional Bureau for Africa is the largest of UNDPs five regional programmes, accounting for nearly half of all UNDP core programme funding.
The Africa Bureau draws on UNDPs global knowledge network to provide capacity development and policy support in areas ranging from good governance and peace building to eradicating extreme poverty and fighting HIV/AIDS, in support of the priorities set up by Africas governments.
Building on commitments by African leaders to meet common political and development challenges, the Bureau energetically supports the African Union and the New Partnership for Africas Development (NEPAD) as well as efforts by African countries to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.
Rebeca Grynspan served as Vice-President of Costa Rica from 1994 to 1998, and is currently Director of the Mexico-based subregional office of the UNs Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.
The three new directors will assume their posts at UNDP in the first quarter of 2006.
UNDPs Administrator asked several senior UN officials to propose and/or review candidates. The short-listed candidates were then interviewed by several senior UN officials and high-level UNDP managers, as well as by the UNDP Administrator.
Kilde: www.undp.org
