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UN staff vote no confidence in Annan
(Reuters)
Updated: 2006-03-10 06:44
The U.N. Staff Union voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to express no
confidence in U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and his top managers after Annan
announced plans to overhaul the U.N. bureaucracy.
U.N
Secretary-General Kofi Annan arrives for a news conference in central
London January 30, 2006. [Reuters] | A motion "to express a statement of no confidence in the secretary-general
and his senior management team" was opposed by just two of the more than 500
U.N. employees attending a closed-door emergency meeting of the staff group,
said Staff Union official Guy Candusso.
Annan two days earlier had introduced a 33-page report on U.N. management
reform that proposed outsourcing some U.N. work or moving staff out of the
United States for some translation services, document production, printing and
publishing and information technology.
He also recommended more financial oversight, simplified hiring and firing
procedures, staff buyouts, more training and a modern information system.
The costs of the plan could run to US$500 million. Approval rests in the
hands of the 191 U.N. member-nations.
Annan argued existing rules and regulations "make it very hard for the
organization to conduct its work efficiently or effectively" and said a "radical
overhaul" was needed.
But staff members said they feared he would slash payrolls and programs in
order to cut down on costs.
U.S. Ambassador John Bolton, whose government has pushed hard for extensive
reforms at the United Nations, declined comment on the staff vote but said all
organizations needed to regularly review their activities to see which were
better performed internally and which could be outsourced.
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