What’s Wrong With This Picture?

This photo ran in Thursday’s New York Times under the article heading, “Kenya’s Political Rivals Meet.” But there’s something odd here and it’s not merely the fake smiles of Mwai Kibaki and Raila Odinga – it’s the presence of Kofi Annan. That Annan, a former UN Secretary-General, is leading the international community’s Kenya delegation is a testament to the limited clout of the UN’s Ban Ki-Moon, a man whose leadership has been wobbly and whose actions have often proved naive and ineffective.

By most accounts, Ban’s tenure has been defined by few diplomatic successes. He’s pushed hard on global warming, but has been able to make the Bush administration budge little – if at all. On Darfur, he’s naively chatted it up with Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir but has only been able to get him to authorize a toothless UN-AU peacekeeping force. On the Middle East, despite some travel to the region, Ban’s successes remain undefined as well. The outsourcing of the Kenya problem to Mr. Annan is a further sign of his poor leadership.

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Not long ago, I attended a speech by Kenneth Roth, the head of Human Rights Watch. Talking about Ban Ki-Moon, Roth told an interesting story. He said that he’d met with the Secretary-General a number of times to discuss human rights issues and that, during one recent meeting, they had talked about the conflict in Sudan. Ban had insisted, quite forcefully, that he was doing all he could to bring about an end to the genocide and he asked Roth to give his diplomacy a chance. The Sudanese government, the Secretary-General had lamely suggested, genuinely appeared to be responding to his entreaties and was showing signs of wanting to change its policy on Darfur.

Roth, shocked by such a claim, recalled that he’d told the Secretary-General that such a view was absurd and naive, and that the Sudanese government was not going to change its policy unless there was a credible military or economic threat forcing their hand. Ban remained unconvinced by Roth’s assertions, however, believing that his gentle diplomacy still had a good chance of ending the conflict.

In many ways, Ban’s soft approach on the Darfur issue characterizes his tentative leadership style on the international stage. This is unfortunate, since his job demands someone with a strong voice and a commanding authority. The UN’s Secretary-General has little decision-making ability; instead, the position’s power comes from the force of the executive’s personality. Ban, from what we’ve seen so far, does not appear to have the strength of character needed to compel foreign leaders into action. Furthermore, his approach to conflict has often been naive and overly-trusting, as evidenced by the Sudan failure.

The fact that Annan, and not Ban himself, is leading the effort to end the violence in Kenya is the latest indication that the Secretary-General has yet to find his place as an effective world leader.