Mountain View

Overview

Kofi Atta Annan (; born 8 April 1938) is a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations from January 1997 to December 2006. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize. He is the founder and chairman of the Kofi Annan Foundation, as well as chairman of The Elders, an international organization founded by Nelson Mandela.

Born in Kumasi, Annan went on to study economics at Macalester College, international relations from the Graduate Institute Geneva and management at MIT. Annan joined the UN in 1962, working for the World Health Organization‘s Geneva office. He went on to work in several capacities at the UN Headquarters including serving as the Under-Secretary-General for peacekeeping between March 1992 and December 1996. He was appointed as the Secretary-General on 13 December 1996 by the Security Council, and later confirmed by the General Assembly, making him the first office holder to be elected from the UN staff itself. He was re-elected for a second term in 2001, and was succeeded as Secretary-General by Ban Ki-moon on 1 January 2007.

As the Secretary-General, Annan reformed the UN bureaucracy; worked to combat HIV, especially in Africa; and launched the UN Global Compact. He has been criticized for not expanding the Security Council and faced calls for resignation after an investigation into the Oil-for-Food Programme. After leaving the UN, he founded the Kofi Annan Foundation in 2007 to work on international development. In 2012, Annan was the UN-Arab League Joint Special Representative for Syria, to help find a resolution to ongoing conflict there. Annan quit after becoming frustrated with the UN’s lack of progress with regard to conflict resolution. In September 2016, Annan was appointed to lead a UN commission to investigate the Rohingya crisis.

Early years and education

Kofi Annan was born in the Kofandros section of Kumasi in the Gold Coast (now Ghana) on 8 April 1938. His twin sister Efua Atta, who died in 1991, shared the middle name Atta, which in the Akan means ‘twin’. Annan and his sister were born into one of the country’s Ashanti and Fante aristocratic families; both of their grandfathers and their uncle were tribal chiefs.

In the Akan names tradition, some children are named according to the day of the week on which they were born, and/or in relation to how many children precede them. Kofi in Akan is the name that corresponds with Friday. Annan has said his surname rhymes with “cannon” in English.

From 1954 to 1957, Annan attended the elite Mfantsipim school, a Methodist boarding school in Cape Coast founded in the 1870s. Annan has said that the school taught him “that suffering anywhere concerns people everywhere”. In 1957, the year Annan graduated from Mfantsipim, the Gold Coast gained independence from the UK and began using the name “Ghana”.

In 1958, Annan began studying economics at the Kumasi College of Science and Technology, now the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology of Ghana. He received a Ford Foundation grant, enabling him to complete his undergraduate studies in economics at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, United States, in 1961. Annan then completed a diplme d’tudes approfondies DEA degree in International Relations at The Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1961-62. After some years of work experience, he studied at the MIT Sloan School of Management (1971-72) in the Sloan Fellows program and earned a master’s degree in management.

Annan is fluent in English, French, Akan, some Kru languages and other African languages.

In 1962, Kofi Annan started working as a Budget Officer for the World Health Organization, an agency of the United Nations (UN). From 1974 to 1976, he worked as the Director of Tourism in Ghana. In 1980 he became the head of personnel for the office of the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) in Geneva. In 1983 he became the director of administrative management services of the UN Secretariat in New York. In the late 1980s, Annan was appointed as an Assistant Secretary-General of the UN in three consecutive positions: Human Resources, Management and Security Coordinator (1987-1990); Program Planning, Budget and Finance, and Controller (1990-1992); and Peacekeeping Operations (March 1993 – December 1996).

When Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali established the Department of Peacekeeping Operations in 1992, Annan was appointed to the new department as Deputy to then Under Secretary-General Marrick Goulding. Annan was subsequently appointed to succeed Goulding and assumed the office of USG DPKO in March 1993. He was therefore Head of peacekeeping during the battle of Somalia and the resulting collapse of the UNOSOM II peacekeeping mission, and during the Rwandan Genocide of 1994. On 29 August 1995, while Boutros-Ghali was unreachable on an airplane, Annan instructed United Nations officials to “relinquish for a limited period of time their authority to veto air strikes in Bosnia.” This move allowed NATO forces to conduct Operation Deliberate Force and made him a favorite of the United States. According to Richard Holbrooke, Annan’s “gutsy performance” convinced the United States that he would be a good replacement for Boutros-Ghali.

In 2003 Canadian ex-General Romo Dallaire, who was force commander of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda, claimed that Annan was overly passive in his response to the imminent genocide. In his book Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (2003), General Dallaire asserted that Annan held back UN troops from intervening to settle the conflict, and from providing more logistical and material support. Dallaire claimed that Annan failed to provide responses to his repeated faxes asking for access to a weapons depository; such weapons could have helped Dallaire defend the endangered Tutsis. In 2004, ten years after the genocide in which an estimated 800,000 people were killed, Annan said, “I could and should have done more to sound the alarm and rally support.”

In his book Interventions: A Life in War and Peace, Annan again argued that DPKO could have made better use of the media to raise awareness of the violence in Rwanda and put pressure on governments to provide the troops necessary for an intervention. Annan explained that the events in Somalia and the collapse of the UNOSOM II mission fostered a hesitation amongst UN Member states to approve robust peacekeeping operations. As a result, when the UNAMIR mission was approved just days after the battle, the resulting force lacked the troop levels, resources and mandate to operate effectively.

Annan served as Under-Secretary-General from March 1994 to October 1995. He was appointed a Special Representative of the Secretary-General to the former Yugoslavia, serving for five months before returning to his duties as Under-Secretary-General in April 1996.

Secretary-General of the United Nations

Appointment

Post-UN career

Following his two terms as Secretary-General, Annan was immediately suggested as a candidate to become Ghana’s next President.

Kofi Annan Foundation

In 2007, Annan established the Kofi Annan Foundation, an independent, not-for-profit organization that works to promote better global governance and strengthen the capacities of people and countries to achieve a fairer, more peaceful world.

The Foundation believes that fair and peaceful societies rest on three pillars: Peace and Security, Sustainable Development and Human Rights and the Rule of Law, and they have made it their mission to mobilise the leadership and the political resolve needed to tackle threats to these three pillars ranging from violent conflict to flawed elections and climate change, with the aim of achieving a fairer, more peaceful world.

The Foundation provides the analytical, communication and co-ordination capacities needed to ensure that these objectives are achieved. Kofi Annan’s contribution to peace worldwide is delivered through mediation, political mentoring, advocacy and advice. Through his engagement, Kofi Annan aims to strengthen local and international conflict resolution capabilities. The Foundation provides the analytical and logistical support to facilitate this in co-operation with relevant local, regional and international actors. The Foundation is guided by the following values and principles:

  • “The primacy of dialogue, tolerance and reconciliation as instruments for building and preserving peace within communities and between countries.
  • Respect for the rule of law and human rights as the foundations of good governance and democratic accountability.
  • The need to reduce hunger and poverty, and promote equality of opportunity to alleviate human suffering.
  • The Foundation is prepared to take timely action on important and pressing issues based on careful research and analysis.
  • The Foundation is non-partisan and serves as a neutral actor in conflict resolution activities.
  • The Foundation works in close cooperation with other organizations, public or private, with proven competencies in order to advance its mission.
  • The Foundation does not duplicate the effective efforts of others and only acts when there is a clear added value.
  • The Foundation is an independent, not-for-profit organization under Swiss law.
  • The Foundation is funded by a mix of public and private donors. Particular care is given to ensure that funding sources are beyond reproach and that contributions are politically untied.”

The Foundation works mainly through private diplomacy, where Kofi Annan provides informal counsel and participates in discreet diplomatic initiatives to avert or resolve crises by applying his unique experience and inspirational leadership. He is often asked to intercede in crises, sometimes as an impartial independent mediator, sometimes as a special envoy of the international community. In recent years he has provided such counsel to Burkina Faso, Kenya, Myanmar, Senegal, Syria/Iraq and Colombia.

KNDR

Following the outbreak of violence during the 2007 Presidential elections in Kenya, the African Union established a Panel of Eminent African Personalities to assist in finding a peaceful solution to the crisis.

The panel, headed by Annan, managed to convince the two principal parties to the conflict, President Mwai Kibaki‘s Party of National Unity (PNU) and Raila Odinga‘s Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), to participate in the Kenya National Dialogue and Reconciliation Process (KNDR). Over the course of 41 days of negotiations, several agreements regarding taking actions to stop the violence and remedying its consequences were signed. On 28 February President Mwai Kibaki and Raila Odinga signed a coalition government agreement. Kofi Annan and was widely lauded by many Kenyans for this landmark achievement.

Joint Special Envoy for Syria

Personal life

In 1965, Kofi Annan married Titi Alakija, a Nigerian woman from a well-to-do family. Several years later they had a daughter, Ama, and later a son, Kojo. The couple separated in the late 1970s and divorced in 1983. In 1984, Annan married Nane Maria Lagergren, a Swedish lawyer at the U.N and a maternal half-niece of Raoul Wallenberg. Mr. Annan also had a loyal and long-serving chauffeur John Miller (Mr. Miller) who still is a close friend and confidant to Kofi and his son Kojo.

Honours and awards

Honours

2000: Companion of the Order of the Star of Ghana
2000: Grand Cross Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland
2001: Grand Cross with Collar of the Order of the Star of Romania
2002: Knight Commander of the Most Courteous Order of Lesotho
2005: Grand Collar of the Order of Liberty (Portugal)
2006: Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Netherlands Lion
2007: Grand Decoration of Honour in Gold with Sash for Services to the Republic of Austria
2007: Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George (GCMG) from Queen Elizabeth II (UK)
2008: Grand Cross 1st class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany

Awards

2000: Kora All Africa Music Awards in the category of Lifetime Achievement
2001: Nobel Foundation, The Nobel Peace Prize, jointly presented to Kofi Annan and the United Nations
2002: winner of the “Profiles in Courage Award“, given by the JFK Memorial Museum
2002: The American Whig-Cliosophic Society James Madison Award for Distinguished Public Service.
2003: Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
2003: Freedom Prize of the Max Schmidheiny Foundation at the University of St. Gallen
2004: Freedom medal
2006: International World Order of Culture, Science and Education, Award of the European Academy of Informatization, Belgium
2006: Inter Press Service, International Achievement Award for Annan’s lasting contributions to peace, security, and development
2006: Olof Palme Prize
2007: Wooden Crossbow, special award from the Swiss World Economic Forum
2007: People in Europe Award of Verlagsgruppe Passau
2007: MacArthur Foundation, MacArthur Award for International Justice
2007: North-South Prize of the Council of Europe
2008: Peace of Westphalia Prize
2008: Harvard University Honors Prize
2008: Gottlieb Duttweiler Award
2008: Peace of Westphalia Prize – Mnster (Westfalen)
2008: Open Society Award – CEU Business School Budapest
2011: Gothenburg Award
2012: Confucius Peace Prize

Honorary degrees