The Thin Blue Line - UN Senior Management's Sense of Impunity
Editor's note:Mukesh Kapila is professor of Global Health and Humanitarian Affairs at the University of Manchester and a frequent senior advisor in the UN. He is also a frequent critic of mismanagement in the UN. On May 8th we posted links to articles from the NY Times and DEVEX on the UNOPS scandal which led to the resignation of its Executive Director. If you missed the post, click here.
In this recorded Zoom call, Mukesh Kapila gives the background to the UNOPS scandal with Al Jazeera's UN correspondent, Kristen Saloomey and Ian Williams, President of the Foreign Press Association, frequent contributor to the New Internationalist and Associate Professor at the Bard Bard Center for Globalization and International Affairs.
This fascinating interview with Mukesh Kapila should remind all of us of the power of those who have worked inside the UN system to critique its weaknesses and failures, and to do so constructively. One important point Mukesh makes is that he did so on his own blog, and not by going to news media. This was enough for the big media groups, including the NY Times to pick up the trail, do their own investigations, and publish stories that brought changes - in this case starting with the resignation of the UNOPS ED, but also to rethinking in the governments which sat on the UNOPS Board and let all this happen.
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