Kofi Annan was born in the Kofandros section of Kumasi in the Gold Coast (now Ghana) on 8 April 1938. both of his grandfathers and their uncle were tribal chiefs.
From 1954 to 1957, Annan attended the elite Mfantsipim school, a Methodist boarding school in Cape Coast. Annan said that the school taught him “that suffering anywhere concerns people everywhere”.
In 1957, the year Annan graduated from Mfantsipim, the Gold Coast gained independence from the UK and began using the name “Ghana”.
In 1958, Annan began studying economics at the Kumasi College of Science and Technology. He received a Ford Foundation grant, enabling him to complete his undergraduate studies in economics at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, United States, in 1961.
CAREER
Annan then completed a DEA degree in International Relations at The Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1961–62.
Annan was fluent in English, French, Akan, and some Kru languages as well as other African language. In 1962, Kofi Annan started working as a budget officer for the World Health Organization.
In 1980 he became the head of personnel for the office of the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) in Geneva. In 1983 he became the director of administrative management services of the UN Secretariat in New York.
In 1987, Annan was appointed as an Assistant Secretary-General for Human Resources Management and Security Coordinator for the UN system. When Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali established the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) in 1992.
SECRETERY GENERAL
In 1996, Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali ran unopposed for a second term. Although he won 14 of the 15 votes on the Security Council, he was vetoed by the United States.
After four deadlocked meetings of the Security Council, Boutros-Ghali suspended his candidacy, becoming the only Secretary-General ever to be denied a second term. Annan was the leading candidate.
The UN Security Council recommended Annan on 13 December 1996. Confirmed four days later by the vote of the General Assembly,he started his first term as Secretary-General on 1 January 1997.
The Security Council recommended Annan for a second term on 27 June 2001, and the General Assembly approved his reappointment on 29 June 2001.
REFORMATIONS
A comprehensive reform agenda was issued on 14 July 1997 entitled Renewing the United Nations: A Programme for Reform . Key proposals included the introduction of strategic management to strengthen unity of purpose • The establishment of the position of Deputy Secretary-General, a reduction in administrative costs, the consolidation of the UN at the country level, and reaching out to civil society and the private sector as partners.
On 31 January 2006, Annan outlined his vision for a comprehensive and extensive reform of the UN in a policy speech to the United Nations Association UK.
In March 2000, Annan appointed the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations to assess the shortcomings of the then existing system and to make specific and realistic recommendations for change.
REFORMS
Annan called to “free our fellow men and women from the abject and dehumanizing poverty in which more than 1 billion of them are currently confined”.
At the Millennium Summit in September 2000, national leaders adopted the Millennium Declaration, which was subsequently implemented by the United Nations Secretariat as the Millennium Development Goals in 2001.
Towards the end of the 1990s, increased awareness of the destructive potential of epidemics such as HIV/AIDS pushed public health issues to the top of the global development agenda.
In April 2001, Annan issued a five-point “Call to Action” to address the HIV/AIDS pandemic. In June of that year, the General Assembly of the United Nations committed to the creation of such a fund during a special session on AIDS, and the permanent secretariat of the Global Fund was subsequently established in January 2002.
REFORMS
Following the failure of Annan and the International Community to intervene in the genocide in Rwanda and in Srebrenica, Annan asked whether the international community had an obligation in such situations to intervene to protect civilian populations.
Annan argued that individual sovereignty the protections afforded by the Declaration of Human Rights and the Charter of the UN was being strengthened, while the notion of state sovereignty was being redefined by globalization and international co-operation. As a result, the UN and its member states had to consider a willingness to act to prevent conflict and civilian suffering
The International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty published its final report in 2001, which focused on not on the right of states to intervene but a responsibility to protect populations at risk. 2005, Annan included the doctrine of “Responsibility to Protect”
NOBEL PRIZE
In 2001, its centennial year, the Nobel Committee decided that the Peace Prize was to be divided between the UN and Annan. They were awarded the Peace Prize “for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world.
Having revitalized the UN and for having given priority to human rights. The Nobel Committee also recognized his commitment to the struggle to containing the spread of HIV in Africa and his declared opposition to international terrorism.
FAREWELL
On 19 September 2006, Annan gave a farewell address to world leaders gathered at the UN headquarters in New York, in anticipation of his retirement on 31 December.
In the speech he outlined three major problems of “an unjust world economy, world disorder, and widespread contempt for human rights and the rule of law”, which he believed “have not resolved, but sharpened” during his time as Secretary-General.
He also pointed to violence in Africa, and the Arab–Israeli conflict as two major issues warranting attention.
Annan died in a Swiss hospital in the early hours of Saturday at the age of 80. He was surrounded in his last days by his second wife Nane and children Kojo and Nina.
