Africa “cannot wait any longer” to have a bigger voice in the United Nations’ most powerful body, Sierra Leone’s president said on Monday, as he joined the UN chief and other senior officials in urging reform of the UN Security Council (UNSC) to end a decade-long underrepresentation of the world’s second-most populous continent.
“The time for half-measures and incremental progress is over. Africa must be heard, and its demands for justice and equity must be met,” Sierra Leone’s President Julius Maada Bio told a UNSC meeting that he was also chairing. Calling Africa the “unquestionable victim” of an imbalanced, outdated and unrepresentative UNSC structure, Bio pressed a longstanding bid for African countries to get more council seats, including two permanent and potentially veto-wielding spots. While African countries aren’t the only ones that have on many occasions in the past demanded more representation in the UNSC, there is a general sense that Bio’s presence has at least accentuated the issue ahead of a UN “Summit of the Future” and the annual General Assembly gathering due to be held next month.
President Julius Maada Bio’s call for the UNSC reform has been echoed by the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, UN General Assembly President Dennis Francis and other senior officials, who have stressed that the world body must reflect the real distribution of power in today’s world as and not in 1945 when it was created to maintain peace in the wake of World War II.
“We cannot accept that the world’s preeminent peace and security body lacks a permanent voice for a continent of well over a billion people … nor can we accept that Africa’s views are undervalued on questions of peace and security, both on the continent and around the world,” the UN chief said. Recently, in May, the UNSC called for the role of African countries to be strengthened in addressing global security and development challenges. The current composition of the UNSC reflects the post-WWII power structure at a time when most of Africa was still under European control.