"Through the Grapevine"
June 21, 1999
Thailand and New Zealand continue to battle it out for leadership of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in one of the most contentious inter-governmental elections in recent history. Thailand's Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Asda Jayanama says the WTO election process has become more complicated and ugly each day, "not so much because provisions of the (WTO) constitution are insufficiently precise, but because the consultation process for arriving at a concensus has been non-transparent and inconsistent." Writing in the current issue of the Nordic publication "Development Today," Jayanama points out that no one knows how many votes each of the two candidates - New Zealand's Mike Moore and Thailand's Supachai Panitchpakdi - has received because only the "chair" and the "facilitators" are privy to this secret information. The current deadlock clearly shows that the so-called rule-based WTO is not rule-based at all, "but a non-transparent and undemocratic institution with huge room for the powerful to manipulate the decision-making process." Jayanama says that a group of countries supportive of Moore has rejected a wide open vote, thus in effect vetoing the provisions of the WTO constitution. "We should ask them why this most democratic and transparent form of decision-making is rejected by some of the most democratic countries in the world. They should also be reminded that voting is part of the WTO constitution while veto is not," he adds.
Jayanama also makes a comparison between the WTO and the election proess for chosing the Administrator of the UN Develpment Programme (UNDP). Although the recent UNDP election was comparatively smooth, some members of the UNDP Executive Board felt there was no consultation in the normal sense of the word, "but merely passing of information on Annan's chioce of Administrtor." In the case of the UNDP, the Secretary General makes the appointment, but in consultation with the Executive Board. Jayanama says that while recognizing that Annan did consult the Board through its President (who, incidentally, was Jayanama himself), some, especially those who supported Danish Minister for Development Cooperation Poul Nielson - the only announced candidate for the position of UNDP Administrator - felt that the Board could not really react to what in effect was already a fait accompli...
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