Anwar Ibrahim as UN Sec-Gen?

Kofi Annan’s term as UN Sec-Gen is coming to an end. President Bush hopped in quickly to say that Kofi’s replacement is expected to come from Asia, inplicitly invoking the UN convention of regional rotation when selecting a new Sec-Gen.

The Sec-Gen normally serves two terms, each of 5 years duration. There's no official restriction to a third, but most of those offered that had consistently refused as the stress and burdens must have been too much to bear for another 5 years.

Though the previous Sec-Gen, Buotros Buotros-Ghali was from (Egypt) Africa too, he only served one term, with the USA veto-ing his second term. Thus his successor, Kofi Annan, was selected from Africa too. Africa has now enjoyed 3 terms in that seat.

Ignoring the 1st (from UK) who was only in an acting capacity for 3 months or so, the established post went to Europeans twice in a row (Norway and Sweden) though the second bloke, Dag Hammarskjold, died in an aircrash two years before the end of his 2nd term.

The 3rd and only Asian UN Sec-Gen was the highly respected U Thant, a Burmese. U Thant served for two distinguished terms, from 1961 to 1971, during which he saw through a significant number of world crisis such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, the civil war in Congo, the 6-Day War in 1967, Indo-Pakistani War, birth of Bangladesh, Prague Spring, the invasion of Czechoslovakia and various international disputes.

U Thant

He also established many of the UN's development and environmental agencies, funds and programmes, including the UN Development Programme, UNCTAD, UNITAR and the UN Environmental Programme.

U Thant was the only UN Sec-Gen who retired on friendly terms with all the power blocs - bearing in mind this was during the Cold War. He was utterly relieved when he finished his 2nd term, saying he felt a 'great sense of relief bordering on liberation' on relinqushing the 'burdens of office'.

Belmont Island, in New York City waters across from United Nations headquarters, has been unofficially renamed U Thant Island as a token to his legacy.

He was followed by another European, the controversial Kurt Waldheim of Austria who had some dodgy past during WWII as an alleged Nazi officer. China veto-ed a 3rd term for him. Then South America was represented by Javier Perez de Cuellar. Buotros Buotros-Ghali and Kofi Annan followed.

Also by unspoken convention, candidates from the 5 permanent members of the Security Council, USA, Russia, China, France and UK, would not be presented or more likely won't be accepted. There were rumours that Bill Clinton had eyed the post, but he would have a snowflake chance in hell. Even more frightening, President Bush had proposed Tony Blair for the Sec-Gen's post after the latter finished his tour as PM of UK. May God spare us this dubious honour.

And neither would candidates be accepted from nations that are perceived as being in one camp or another, which effectively rules out Australia, Japan, and perhaps today, even India. Though India has been viewed as a leading light among non-aligned nations, her current alignment with the USA is worrying to many.

Bush’s remarks means that the US member of the UN Security Council will be pushing for an Asian candidate. Obviously they have someone in mind, someone whom the USA believes will be more amenable to American wishes.

Bush added: "You'll find that we will work closely with friends and allies to come up with the best candidate, but we won't be committing publicly. The criterion I'm for is somebody who wants to spread liberty and enhance the peace, do difficult things like confront tyranny, worry about the human condition, blow the whistle on human rights violations."

Tyranny, human rights violations …? Bush has just described his own regime.

However, neo-con chickenhawk John Bolton, US Ambassador to the UN, put on the best spin by saying the best possible candidate should fill the post, regardless of region.

Four names have been proposed for the Sec-Gen post. Three have been officially nominated: Deputy Thai Prime Minister Surakiart Sathirathai; Sri Lankan disarmament specialist and government adviser Jayantha Dhanapala; and Indian novelist Shashi Tharoor, who incidentally is an under secretary at the UN.

South Korea has also announced that its foreign minister, Ban Ki-moon, would run for the post though his name has not been formally submitted. I am sure the USA would favour most of them.

Eons ago, political experts proposed Lee Kuan Yew as an Asian candidate for the post, saying such a super as well as super-ego bloke was way too big for a small island like Singapore. Well, we know that didn't eventuate, so the world was either denied his brilliance or spared his conceit.

When asked, Bush said he would not be against a Muslim in the post.

Very recently, Anwar Ibrahim has been touted as a possible candidate. I am sure the Americans would be delighted to support his nomination.

In fact, Anwar himself revealed that he has been approached to put his name forward for the post, but he has yet to decide on running. I wonder whether he has to be first nominated by his own nation, Malaysia?

Anwar said that foreign ministers and leaders have asked him in the past three months whether he would run for the post. He claimed: "People do ask. Even here and overseas, people do ask."

Maybe one of them was his buddy Paul Wolfowitz? Today, we all are aware that Wolfowitz was the chief architect of the neo-con plans to invade Iraq, even prior to 9/11.

I would recommend that Anwar Ibrahim seriously considers the post, since his likelihood of returning to UMNO and becoming its president appears to be pretty slim. And I find that he can fulfil the roles that Kofi Annan had described of his job:

"I am a cheerleader, I am a promoter, I am a salesman, I am a debt collector, I am a father confessor and there are other aspects I still have to discover."