This vote “comes to reward the past four years”, welcomed the former Minister of François Hollande, favorite and supported by Emmanuel Macron.
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Audrey Azoulay can savor a victory with revengers. The former Minister of Culture François Hollande was elected, Tuesday, November 9, in Paris, for a second four-year term at the head of the United Nations Organization of Education, Scientific and Culture, the UNESCO. With 155 votes in his favor, nine against and an abstention, the score is without appeal, and slice with its current success of 2017. At the time, M me Azoulay had benefited from divisions between countries Arabs to win over the thread, to the general surprise, against Qatari and Egyptian candidates. Its taking office at the Paris headquarters of UNESCO had, moreover, coincided with the resounding withdrawal of the United States and Israel of the Organization, accused of propaletinian bias.
This time, the suspense was most limited, even if the vote was held, as the use, with secret ballots. No competitor had dared to embark on the race against an outgoing Director General Favorite and supported by Emmanuel Macron. The unknown resided in the extent of the result. African states, then the Arab countries, Asian states, including China, spoke over weeks in favor of renewal. Even Qatar and Egypt supported its second term.
This vote “comes to reward the past four years”, welcomed M Azoulay, after his renewal, saying “[his] pride and [his] happiness of being re-elected to clear and massive way “. In fact, the climate seems to have appealed within UNESCO, despite the fractures that the Pandemic of Covid-19 has only aggravated in the multilateral institutions, whether within the United Nations or the World Health Organization.
Relaunch of large operations
To pacify the debates, M me Azoulay first sought to “depolitize” the organization, especially on the Israeli-Palestinian question, offering its mediation as soon as a sensitive text appears on the agenda, so that it is adopted by consensus. “It was necessary to diminish the political tensions that, too long, hindered UNESCO’s action when they tended to instrumentalisation”, to enable UNESCO to focus “on its mandate and [de]. Getting lost in a discussion to which it only brought little “, explained M me Azoulay to some journalists.
Far from diplomatic players, the Executive Director also won to revive large operations, in order to give visibility to the organization on the ground. The PHARE project of the moment concerns the watch city of Mosul, the old “capital” of the organization Islamic State (Ei) in Iraq: it is a question of rebuilding the Al-Nouri mosque, destroyed by the EI at the time of His defeat, and two neighboring Christian churches. Another initiative, of less magnitude, was set up in Beirut, in order to support the reconstruction of schools damaged by the explosion on the port of the Lebanese capital, in August 2020.
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