Thomas Ekvall — Representative in Khartoum.
Where do you live?
Tenerife, Spain. Soon, Sweden, following the rather definitive life event of my wife’s passing.
What book are you currently reading?
Machiavelli’s The Prince, a 500-year-old manual that remains awkwardly relevant to institutions today.
If you could travel without restrictions, where would you go?
Nowhere. After living in 11 different countries for more than a year in each and visiting 85 others, I’ve concluded that the world is broadly the same; only the paperwork may differ.
Your best experience with UNICEF?
Designing and building a gravity-fed water system for a small town about 50 years ago. UNICEF’s contribution was largely unintentional. A local church funded it, I managed it, and procurement consisted of me carrying around $10,000 in cash and buying what was needed. Entirely against regulations, which may explain why it worked. Upon completion, I invited senior UNICEF staff to inspect it. The Representative declared, “This is substantial, we should do more of these,” while my supervisor, previously unaware of its existence, promptly took credit. No one asked inconvenient questions about funding or execution. A model of institutional efficiency.
Your biggest challenge when working for UNICEF?
Navigating colleagues who viewed UNICEF less as a mission and more as a convenient vehicle for political agendas.
Navigating colleagues who viewed UNICEF less as a mission and more as a convenient vehicle for political agendas.
What is your biggest fear for the future of children? What is your greatest hope?
Fear: None worth dramatising. What we are seeing is a temporary dip in a long upward trajectory.
Hope: That trajectory, 80 years of progress, will resume shortly, assuming we resist the urge to overcomplicate it.
What is one piece of advice you would give to the UNICEF Executive Director?
Commission an honest study on why aid failed Africa and resist the temptation to edit the conclusions.
Do you have suggestions to improve XUNICEF?
Yes: turn it into a forum that actually asks and debates uncomfortable questions, why we failed Africa, what we got wrong, and how Africa fell behind while we congratulate ourselves.
Thomas can be contacted via thomas.ekvall9435@gmail.com
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