Fifty-eight World Trade Organization (WTO) members have supported a proposal from the African Group, urging Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala to pursue a second four-year term.
This information was shared in a statement released by the WTO on its website on Monday, July 2024.
According to the statement, 58 WTO members expressed their support during a meeting of the WTO General Council on July 22.
Okonjo-Iweala, 70, said she was very grateful for the support from members. “Everything that I’ve accomplished, we’ve accomplished together,” she said.
The director general said that she took the call of members very seriously and was favourably inclined. She said she would get back to members very soon regarding her intentions.
Okonjo-Iweala, the seventh WTO boss, took office on March 1, 2021, for a single term of four years which will expire on August 31, 2025. She is eligible for a second term.
The former Nigerian Finance Minister navigated stiff opposition to become the first woman and the first African to serve as WTO Director-General. Before her current appointment, she twice served as Nigeria’s Finance Minister from 2003 to 2006 and from 2011 to 2015. She also briefly acted as Foreign Minister in 2006, the first woman to hold both positions.
The skilled negotiator had a 25-year career at the World Bank as a development economist, rising to the number two position of Managing Director, Operations.
