United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon has appointed reform specialist Carlos Lopes as new executive secretary of the world body’s Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
ECA, the largest UN entity devoted to Africa with around 300 economists and 800 staff, is based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Lopes will have the rank of UN under-secretary-general and will be the senior African in the UN leadership when he takes up his duties.
His main objective is to enhance African strategic capacity by making ECA the largest think-tank in the continent. Lopes has 24 years of UN experience, is fluent in English, French and Portuguese and has vast knowledge of the continent.
Lopes established several institutions, including the main research institute in his home country Guinea Bissau, and has been associated with major reforms of the UN system.
At present, Lopes serves on high-level committees of the UN secretary-general, including the one related to change and reform.
He worked in the Nordic Africa Institute, served as UN resident coordinator in Zimbabwe and Brazil, led UNDP’s Bureau for Development Policy, and served as political director for then secretary-general Kofi Annan.
Currently he is in charge of two UN institutions for training and research: UNITAR in Geneva and the UN Staff College in Turin.
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For over four years, Lopez has managed a UNDP project portfolio of about $1 billion. Since 2006 he had the rank of UN assistant secretary-general.
