A NEW SWAGGER AT NIGERIA'S UN MISSION
By Chika Onyeani

There is a new swagger at the Nigeria House on 44th Street and Second Avenue, the edifice that houses the Permanent Mission of Nigeria to the United Nations, representing Nigeria which recently won a non-permanent seat to the UN's highest body, the Security Council. It is a swagger of confidence, it is a Rambo-like swagger, of having been knocked down, bloodied and bleeding all over, yet being able to get up to continue the fight. It is the swagger of a people united in victory no matter how insignificant that victory might seem to those who might be in the know of the workings of the United Nations, but a victory that nonetheless is more than cherished as a testament to the recharging bull as epitomized by that in the Wall Street area of New York. It is the swagger of a country battered by years of unsolvable corruption in the highest corridors of power, by the terrorizing "419" scams of a minutiae number of its citizens dropping Nigeria to a cesspool of unimaginable public relations nightmare, but nevertheless at the highest echelons of world power, performed more than they had been given the credit.

There are those who might see what happened to Nigeria at the United Nations as insignificant, but the fact remains that on the 15th of October, 2009, Nigeria was elected to the non-permanent seat of the United Nations Security Council with the highest number of votes, 186 out of 192 - that's 186 countries out of 192 cast their vote for Nigeria. Others might chime in and say "so what," after all Gabon a much smaller African country than Nigeria secured the second highest number of votes of 184.

There is also the perception that Nigeria's election was a foregone conclusion as the country had already been endorsed by the regional group, ECOWAS (Economic Community of West Africa States) as well as the AU (the African Union) as against two other smaller regional countries. It was this false perception that Nigeria's election was a walk-through that the former Nigerian Ambassador to the United Nations, Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, who was Nigeria's last Ambassador when the country was elected to the Security Council 15 years ago, seriously warned against when he gave an interview to some Nigerian reporters days before the vote.

Stated Gambari, ""Well, the endorsement counts, but at the same time, you have to also present yourself. You are endorsed by the AU but what are you saying about the contributions you have made and are going to make? And recall, this is secret ballot. You need a two-thirds of the votes in the secret ballot. So, that's why I don't think we should just assume that we are in. We have to show that we are worthy, not only that, the number of votes you get, even if you are in, is very important. It shows the credits and the credibility you have in the international community by the number of votes you get even if you are elected as non-permanent member of the Security Council. So, these are the issues that I believe should be addressed thoroughly and should be taken very seriously..."

Of course, Prof. Gambari was quite right, but he may not have been privy to the fact that his later successor as Permanent Representative and Ambassador to the United Nations, Prof. Joy Ogwu, had anticipated the problems that Gambari had enumerated. As of note, it is necessary to point out that Prof. Ogwu is the first female to hold the position of Permanent Representative which Ambassador Gambari had left in 1999; the first female to hold the position of Nigeria's Director-General of the Institute of International Affairs, which Prof. Gambari had headed, and the only second female to have held the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs of Nigeria, which Gambari had also held. In essence, it would appear that these two intellectual heavyweights would view issues in the same light. Eventually, I have no doubt that she might serve the same two times as President of the Security Council as Prof. Gambari did.

Yes, Prof. Ogwu knew the false perception people had that Nigeria was a shoo-in for the seat, which she had been preparing to surmount from day one she arrived in New York and presented her credentials to the Secretary General of the United Nations. After the presentations, she had given notice to the Secretary-General that Nigeria was back to take its rightful place as the giant of Africa. It wasn't an empty boast nor was she new to the United Nations. From 1988, Ambassador Ogwu served variously as Presidential Delegate and Special Adviser on numerous Nigerian delegations to the United Nations General Assembly; and on the Multinational United Nations Observer Mission in South Africa (UNOMSA) that supervised the country’s transition to majority rule in 1994. And in January 2002, the then Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan invited Professor Ogwu to serve as a member of United Nations Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters. In January 2006, she was appointed to serve as Chairman of the Advisory Board for 2006, placing her as the first African woman to serve in that capacity in the annals of the United Nations.

Described by her ambassadorial colleagues as quite solid, intellectually robust and highly efficient and effective, with incredible amount of humility, which they warn should not be taken to diminish her hard-charging goals, Prof. Ogwu set out from day one preparing for Nigeria's eventual re-admission to the Security Council. These accolades from her peers are more than well-deserved having served as chair of U.N.'s Second Committee, her tenure marked by schedules being met, national competing interests being decided by consensus with the result that only three issues were ever taken to a vote.

She was laying the foundation of a brilliant and effective Nigerian. "You don't ever should miss an opportunity to demonstrate excellence," said Prof. Ogwu. Because of the groundwork she had laid with her colleagues, even when it was abruptly announced that Nigeria's President Umaru Yar'Adua would no longer be attending this year's United Nations General Assembly meeting, she wasn't ruffled. Of course, there was the regret that the President would miss the opportunity to meet with President Barack who was slated to chair the Security Council Meeting on Disarmament and Non-Proliferation Treaty, that the Nigerian President would have attended also had he come.

When the vote was cast on October 15, Ambassador had achieved the objectives enumerated earlier, including surpassing the two-thirds majority and actually achieving the highest number of votes, which in essence demonstrated the main point Prof. Gambari had made, which is showing "the credits and the credibility you have in the international community by the number of votes you get even if you are elected as non-permanent member of the Security Council." When the votes were counted and Nigeria had scored big, Gambari was in the forefront to congratulate his constant successor for her exceptional performance. "You see, my greatest concern was that Nigerians would take this vote lightly, especially having secured the approval of the ECOWAS and the AU, and the vote count as I had said is very important. Nigeria came in with flying colors," said Ambassador Gambari.

You would think with her exceptional performance, that Ambassador Ogwu would be pounding her chest and patting herself on the back for her accomplishment. But no, she credits God with everything as well as her “excellent staff” with pulling it off. "These people have been working 24/7, yes including Sundays, last Sunday (October 18, 2009) being the only one they hadn't come to work."

With her high aesthetics which she has been displaying since her arrival in New York, she found the best way to thank all members of the United Nations, with a gift that is readily and identifiably Nigerian: the Benin Bronze Head, beautifully carved and wrapped in paper and presented in a box with Nigerian colors.

As was pointed out earlier, there are those who don't attach any significance to Nigeria's election and dismiss the 186 vote support, and they could be correct because it is what Nigeria does from January 1, 2010 that would be of the greater significance. Ambassador Ogwu is well aware of the country that has just left or would be leaving the Security Council, South Africa. There is every belief that Nigeria would be compared to South Africa in terms of how it performs its functions during its tenure at the Security Council, bearing in mind that South Africa is no longer the country that it was 15 years ago when Nigeria last served in the Council, as well as the fact that South Africa was not the juggernaut it is now, having achieved the status of being accorded a membership in the G20 group of nations, while Nigeria is not. Even the three behemoths on the Council represented by women, Nigeria, Brazil and the United States, could present a challenge.
Some people might scoff at this idea of competition with Brazil and the U.S., but given her background, the others should better watch out for a slam-dunk of Ambassador Ogwu.

Seriously and lastly, this is an election victory that Nigerians should not pooh-pooh at. It is a sign that there are some Nigerians who are willing to invest in rehabilitating the country, in taking whatever little steps they could in sanitizing and re-calibrating the essence of a country that is Nigeria.

As Moe Ene rightly wrote in Kwenu.com, Ambassador Ogwu's accomplishment for Nigeria is a "triumph of diplomacy." A lot of work lies ahead for this indefatigable lady of excellence. Hopefully, she could continue to build on that. It is a giant step towards repositioning Nigeria, rather than the much ballyhooed "re-branding" which has been a big flop.

So watch out before you get run over by the swaggering bulls, or is it the Giant of Africa, at the Nigeria House!!

©October  2009

 

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