UNITED NATIONS, May 17 -- While the selection Christiana Figueres for the UN's top environmental job at the UNFCCC surprised some, not least because she's from Costa Rica, a country of three million people which already has an Assistant Secretary General level post held by Rebecca Grynspan at the UN Development Program, there are wider UN politics at work.
Inner City Press is told by well-placed UN sources that South Africa, whose tourism minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk was on the final two person UNFCCC short list with Ms. Figueres, was taken out of the running because it is now in line for a higher, Under Secretary General level post at the Office of Internal Oversight Services, to replace the outgoing -- but untransparent -- Inga Britt Ahlenius.
But, some still wonder, what of India? They too had a minister on the UNFCCC short list. Some point to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's recent naming of Atul Khare to the number two post in the Department of Peacekeeping Operations as similar, if one level below, South Africa's reward at OIOS. But others say Atul Khare was "not really India's candidate," in that they were merely told of the appointment. We'll see.
Meanwhile in Nairobi, one or two major UN posts are to be filled. The new USG to preside over the UN Office in Nairobi, following Ban's controversial replacement in that function of Ana Tibaijuka by Achim Steiner of Germany, should soon be named. And it appears Ms. Tibaijuka's term at UN HABITAT is expiring.
Africa, which Ban passed over for the Number Two slot in UNDP despite an understanding the Continent would get that post -- Helen Clark wanted Ms. Grynspan, and for now Helen Clark unlike Human Rights High Commissioner Navi Pillay appears to get whatever she wants from Ban -- should have these two Nairobi posts in the bag. But as they did to place Libya on the Human Rights Council, they need to come up with a consensus candidate.
Footnote: Navi Pillay, Inner City Press has told, has wanted the Brazilian Paulo Sergio Pinheiro as her New York representative. So she stacked the four person short list she gave to Ban with "unappointable" people:
Argentine Juan Mendez, when that country already has a USG in Susana Malcorra of DFS, Swede Karin Landgren, just after Margot Wallstrom of that country was given the rape as a weapon of war post, and Ivan Simonovic, whom the sources say Pillay thought couldn't get the post due to opposition from Croatian and international human rights groups.
And see, www.innercitypress.com/posts1oios051710.html
