On The Nation: Lisa Owen interviews Stephen Lewis
Youtube clips from the show are available here.

Lisa Owen: Welcome back. A new straw poll has Helen Clark eighth out of 10 candidates to become UN Secretary-General, but she says she’s pleased with the result and will continue her campaign for the top job. Stephen Lewis is a former Canadian ambassador to the United Nations. He joins me now from Toronto. Good morning. The straw poll out this morning – no women, no women in the top four. What do you think of that?
Stephen Lewis: I think it’s pretty appalling and profoundly objectionable. Everyone, I think, outside the UN has certainly felt for some time – all the UN observers and watchers – that after 70 years of male Secretaries-General it would be important to have a woman finally this time, and so it’s a very disappointing outcome to have four of the top five positions – indeed, the top four positions all male, and it would appear that the hopes and dreams of a woman Secretary-General are gradually dissipating.
Helen Clark is at number eight on that list; she’s dropped a spot; she’s staying in the race, but is it really over for her? Should she bow out at this stage?
I don’t think there’s any need for anyone to bow out if they really want to stay in and continue to campaign behind the scenes, because, of course, there’s a strong element of illusion in all of this. While there are straw polls and while there are readings of straw polls, the decision will be made by the five permanent members of the Security Council, who have a veto. In fact, the decision will be made by the United States and Russia. No others will count when the final ballot is cast. So anyone who wants to stay in should stay in. I think it is realistic to suggest that Helen Clark’s chances are not terribly good at this point, but I can well understand why she would want to continue fighting.
Mm. You’re adamant that this position should be taken by a woman this time around – why?
Well, look, as I say, we’ve had 70 years of men, and surely in the year 2016 some element of gender equality can seep into the United Nations’, you know, encrusted patriarchal system. It’s not as though the men have brought great value to Secretaries-General. I mean, we’ve had Kurt Waldheim, who was an open supporter of the Nazis. When I was there, I worked under Pérez de Cuéllar – lovely man but highly uninfluential. He was succeeded by Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who was a raving egomaniac, and for the last several years, we’ve had Ban Ki-Moon, who – and I don’t mean this to be disrespectful, but – has given mediocrity new meaning. So why should we demand of women something that has never been provided by men, and there are excellent women candidates –people like Helen Clark who’ve run the UNDP; Irina Bokova, who’s run UNESCO. It isn’t as though the men have some superseding capacities that exceed those of the women.
So what’s the view of the men who still remain in the race, then? Should they be there?
Well, personally, profoundly, I don’t think so. I think that there is an element of sexism and misogyny to be involved in a race where the time has come for a woman to be Secretary-General. That doesn’t mean that all the women candidates are sterling. There are one or two who create worries, but the truth is – there are sufficient women candidates who could be chosen, and the men should have the grace and the understanding to recognise that the time has come. My God, how long does it take? 70 years of perpetual male domination of the Secretary-General’s position and a lot of it undistinguished.
But shouldn’t the job go to the best person for the job, regardless of gender, regardless of where they come from in the world? It should just be the best person for the job.
Oh, no, but we never choose—let’s not kid ourselves. There’s a good answer to that question, Lisa, but let’s not kid ourselves, we haven’t been choosing the best person for the job; we’ve been choosing people like Ban Ki-Moon, who can effectively be manipulated by the superpowers. That’s how it has tended to work over the years, and so one shouldn’t ask of women what one has never asked of men, but in truth, there are very good women candidates. So looking at the principle of gender parity, surely there comes a point in time where one can have a woman as Secretary-General. It isn’t as though we’ve gone back and forth.
So which candidate would you choose, then? Which candidate would you choose?
I would not be so invidious as to make that choice. I’m not involved in the choosing; I’m involved merely on the principle that we should have a woman Secretary-General finally at this point of time, who will, I have no doubt, acquit herself with greater recognitions than several previous incumbents.
So if there women are well qualified and fit for the job, why aren’t they featuring strongly in the polls? What does it say about the United Nations? What does it say about the process?
Well, that’s a very good question. It says about the United Nations that it has taken a very very long time to overcome the misogyny and sexism which runs through all of the UN areas. I mean, if you look at all of the senior positions in the United Nations, they’re overwhelmingly held by men, and that is, in this day and age, profoundly wrong. So what we’re dealing with is the fidelity to patriarchy; what we’re dealing with is a system that has been corrupted in terms of gender for decades, and it’s time – at a moment of international enlightenment, when the questions of the rights of women and girls are predominant – that we recognise that that should be part of the Secretary-Generalship of the UN, and I think we have to overcome the Pavlovian instinct to always support a man. I mean, if you look at those votes that were cast in the straw poll, you’ll see that there are so many more discouraging votes cast for the women than for the men.
Well, what do you think—?
Well, what does that mean, that the men are all…?
What do you think the secrecy element to—?
Go ahead, I’m sorry.
Yeah, the fact that the ballot is in secret, what effect does that have, do you think, on the vote? You don’t have to own your vote, really, do you?
Well, it certainly protects those—Absolutely not, and everything can be done—They pretend that it’s transparent because they’re publishing the results of the straw polls, but it’s not transparent at all. You don’t know whether one of the permanent members if discouraging one of the candidates or voting against one of the candidates, which means that candidate is out of the race, because each permanent member has a veto. China, Russia, the United States, the UK, France – they can veto any candidate they wish so that ultimately it come down to a veto, and there is this grand illusion of transparency, which is, frankly—well, it’s just self-incriminating.
So what if the UN does choose another man? The organisation isn’t going to fall apart, isn’t it? It’s just going to be business as usual with a man at the top – again.
Precisely, it will be business as usual. You may find a man who’s stronger than Ban Ki-Moon; you may find a man who has some other priorities; I have no idea. Most of them, in the answers to the questions that were put by various delegations, they were highly elusive, highly generalised; the answers were amorphous and unspecific; you couldn’t get a real sense of what they felt and believed. That’s all part of the diplomatic game. Oh my God, it drives me crazy. I was part of that exercise for many years myself, but I don’t think that UN will fall apart; it will continue as usual, but it would be a pleasure to have a strong and competent woman at the head.
Well, we continue to watch the race with interest. Thanks for joining us this morning, Stephen Lewis.
My pleasure, thank you.
Thank you.

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