The World Trade Organization is now set to have a female director-general, the first such occurrence in the organization's 25-year history. Among all of the candidates vying for the position, only two are now remaining; Nigeria's Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and South Korea's Yoo Myung-hee
According to a statement issued by the WTO on Thursday, one of the two female candidates will be selected to replace the organization current director-general, Roberto Azevedo. Following escalating tensions between China and the United States, Azevedo chose to end his term a year earlier than planned after he was caught in the middle of the dispute.
Whoever of the two will be selected, she will likely have her work cut out for her to enforce the organization's mandate to negotiate and administer rules for international trade. With trade tensions between China and the United States now reaching a fever pitch, the next director-general will need to utilize all of her abilities and wit to hopefully broker a cease fire.
U.S President Donald Trump has openly criticized the organization for allegedly helping China hide its part in the pandemic. Trump had also undermined the WTO's mission by arbitrarily imposed tariffs and sanctions against China and its allies such as Mexico and Canada.
Apart from mediating peace between China and the United States, the WTO's next director-general will have to contend with the turmoil left by the pandemic. Tensions within the organization's member nations have surged over the past few months as the crisis has sent most of the countries' economies into deep recessions. The WTO, which was established back in 1995, is the international mediator for all trade disputes among its 164 member countries.
Okonjo-Iweala, the candidate from Nigeria, is the former finance minister of her home country. She also worked at the World Bank for 25 years, eventually rising to the position of its managing director of operations. Okonjo-Iweala, an economist by profession, is also a chair of the international organization GAVI.
South Korea's Yoo Myung-hee is her home country's first woman trade minister. In a post on social media, Yoo stated that she was deeply grateful for having been selected to participate in the final round in the selection of the WTO's next director-general.
