The global godfather of nations - The United Nations Organization is bankrupt and counting its pennies
AS THE 50th anniversary of the United
Nations (UN) culminated in late
October, the organization struggled to
overcome its worst ever financial crisis.
If the situation does not improve soon,
the world body and its programmes can
suffer serious setbacks, senior UN Officials warn.
The VN has weathered financial difficulties in the past, but this year multiplc demands of increased operations
and programmes have hiked the
expenses, while income has nosedived
over the years.
By end August, only 64 member
states - out of a total of 185 - had
paid their total regular budget contributions. The total outstanding contributions is over us $3.7 billion. This
includes us $850 million earmarked for
the organization's regular budget. The
rest, about us $2.9 billion slotted for the
UN'S peacekeeping budget, skyrocketted
dramatically in recent years, especially
in its operation in former Yugoslavia -
costing a mindblowing us $5 million a
day.
On September 27, the New York
Times quoted the organization's highest
ranking financial officer as sa 'ying that
World bank loan was one of many ideas
being explored "to lift from our shoulders the burden of debt".
Although the I JN has no capital base,
and its rules do not allow borrowing
commercially or from external sources,
the actually autonomous World Bank
(wE) - technically a UN body - may be
interpreted as an acceptable source of
loans. "The crisis cannot be solved
unless we can borrow money," the New
York Times quoted the uN Secretary
General, Bonitos Boutros-Ghali. But
the us opposes the idea, reiterating that
the UN has no authority to borrow externally, and only sovereign governments
borrowed from the we.
Whether the wB's own Board of
Governors, where the its wields substantiai influence would take the same positions, remains to be seen. Ironically, the
us currently owes the UN at least us $1.2
billion in unpaid dues. It is the biggest
debtor partly because it is the biggest
contributor, representing 25 per cent of
the LIN'S regular budget.
NGOS too have raised questions
whether the uN's independence and
integrity could be compromised if it
becomes indebted to the WB like the rest
of the developing world.
The UN Secretariat has recently
imposed a series of restrictions for cost
slashes, including a freeze in recruitment at all levels, a ban on all new CODtracts, and cancellation of all official
tours. However, unless it receives
financial resources in the immec!
future, more drastic steps would ha,
be taken.
A high level working group on
UN'S financial situation, appointe
the General Assembly last year, to
nised - in its recently published re
- the need to review the assessn
scales to apportion the organizati.
expenses more fairly among merT
states as imminent.
Richard von Weizacker, for
President of West Germany who
chaired a group that studied the i
future for two years, says that reforn
the UN's bureaucracy would not clu
the organization's effectiveness as m
as reforming the "will of the mem
- the more important members".
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