By Brian Okoth
Kenyan President William Ruto has called the UN Security Council "dysfunctional" and "undemocratic", saying it has failed to live up to the world’s expectation.
Ruto spoke at the UN General Assembly in New York on Thursday, calling for a more inclusive and pro-active Security Council to prevent conflicts and swiftly resolve ongoing wars.
He said the world’s peace and security systems had "failed."
"We may all agree, without any fear of contradiction, that the world is headed in a most undesirable direction," the Kenyan leader said.
"If any confirmation was ever needed that the United Nations Security Council is dysfunctional, undemocratic, non-inclusive, un-representative and therefore incapable of delivering meaningful progress in our world as presently constituted, the rampant impunity of certain actors on the global scene settles the matter, " he said.
'Inadequate development'
The Kenyan head of state also faulted the United Nations over "inadequate development and limited climate action, amidst technological advancement and enormous wealth."
Ruto added that the "failures" have "left us in a state of paralysis, enduring one of the darkest periods of human existence."
"This is not the occasion for any member of the United Nations to escape, when they should be rising to the challenge of the moment," he said.
Ruto challenged his fellow leaders to defy the "totally unacceptable" status quo that "undermines and cannibalises the United Nations system at the expense of progress in humanity’s collective journey to the future."
The Kenyan president further observed that the world leaders’ failure to keep their promises had caused an "environment of pervasive mistrust."
The mistrust, he said, had been experienced between the global north versus south, developed versus the developing, rich versus poor, polluters versus victims and net emitters versus net victims.
'Abuse of trust'
He added that the mistrust "complicates and frustrates multilateralism," a term used in international relations to refer to the collaboration between several countries in pursuit of a common goal.
"Multilateralism has been failed by the abuse of trust, negligence and impunity," Ruto said.
"In the face of the most urgent crises of our time, it is now clear that the international community has fallen seriously behind in meeting its targets in both climate action and the implementation of the sustainable development goals, as well as their underlying enabler, peace and security."
The Kenyan president said that Africa had been misunderstood for a long time to be a continent of "borrowers."
"We as Africa have come to the world… to work with the rest of the global community and give every human being in this world a decent chance of security and prosperity, by taking necessary actions, mobilising adequate resources for investment, confronting security challenges and resolving conflicts, as we also make our contribution to global prosperity," he said.
UN Security Council membership
The UN Security Council has five permanent members and ten non-permanent members elected for two-year terms by the General Assembly.
The ten non-permanent slots rotate among more than 170 other member countries.
The permanent members are China, France, Russia, the United States and the United Kingdom. The five have veto power, meaning no action that any of them objects to stands a chance of succeeding.
Africa has been pushing for a permanent seat at the UN Security Council since 2005.
The Security Council, which is UN’s centre for harmonising actions of nations, cooperates in solving international problems and in promoting respect for human rights.
