Doha, September 24 (QNA) - The second term of United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, the organization's ninth chief, will end on December 31, as a behind-the-scenes race is underway to select his successor, who will take office on January 1, 2027, and lead an organization confronting a more divided and turbulent world than the one Guterres inherited nearly a decade ago.
The selection of the next UN secretary-general is expected to influence the direction of global diplomacy, shape the international response to crises around the world, and help determine the future course of the multilateral system in the years ahead.
The final decision on the next secretary-general is typically reached between August and October, although there is no formal deadline for completing the process.
To be eligible for the post, a candidate must be nominated by at least one UN member state. Each member state may nominate one candidate, either independently or jointly with other countries. Self-nominations are not permitted.
The President of the UN General Assembly had requested that nominations be submitted by April 1 to enable candidates to participate in scheduled interactive dialogues. The deadline, however, does not prevent additional nominations from being submitted after that date.
The UN Charter does not bar nationals of the five permanent members of the Security Council from seeking the post. However, political practice has traditionally favored selecting a secretary-general who is not a citizen of any of those five countries. Security Council members conduct a series of secret, informal straw polls during the selection process, indicating their position on each candidate as either "encourage," "discourage" or "no opinion."
Seven candidates are currently competing for the complex position, with each putting forward a vision for the priorities of the international organization, as well as proposals to reform it and strengthen its ability to respond to global crises.
Among the candidates is Argentine diplomat Rafael Grossi, who has served as director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) since 2019. His platform focuses on streamlining the UN's administrative processes and making the organization more flexible and effective in responding to crises.
Costa Rican economist and politician Rebeca Grynspan, secretary-general of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), is also in the race. Her vision emphasizes reforming the organization and making greater use of data and technology to anticipate and address economic and development-related crises.
Former Senegalese President Macky Sall, who led his country from 2012 to 2024, is also competing for the post. He was nominated by Burundi and has received support from Senegal. His programme focuses on addressing the debt burden of developing countries, reforming the UN Security Council, and strengthening the representation of Africa and developing nations.
Maria Fernanda Espinosa of Ecuador is another candidate. She has served as foreign minister and defense minister, as well as president of the UN General Assembly. Nominated by Antigua and Barbuda, Espinosa's vision centers on restoring the confidence of member states, strengthening the organization's ability to implement its decisions, and promoting early action to address emerging crises.
From the Caribbean, Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett of Guyana, her country's permanent representative to the United Nations and a former foreign minister, is also seeking the post. Her agenda focuses on improving the efficiency of the international organization, with particular emphasis on climate action, proactive conflict prevention, and advancing the interests of small and developing states.
The race also includes Ugandan diplomat Olara Otunnu, a former UN under-secretary-general and the oldest candidate in the field. His platform calls for restoring the organization's moral authority, continuing institutional reforms, and establishing an international body to oversee the UN's work on the governance of artificial intelligence.
The list of candidates also includes Ecuadorian diplomat Yvonne Abdul-Baki, who was nominated by the Kingdom of Tonga. She has held ministerial positions and served as Ecuador's ambassador to France, Qatar and the United States. Her platform emphasizes direct engagement diplomacy and preventing conflicts before they erupt, drawing on an extensive network of international relations while focusing on achieving practical and measurable results.
The candidates' resumes and political experience alone, however, will not determine the outcome of the race. In practice, the selection hinges on a candidate's ability to build consensus within the UN Security Council, particularly among its permanent members.
The selection process officially began on November 25, but the key to the process remains with the Security Council. The General Assembly, which comprises 193 member states, cannot independently select the secretary-general and must await a recommendation from the 15-member Security Council.
In the formal vote at the Security Council, a candidate needs at least nine votes and must avoid a veto from any of the five permanent members: the United States, Russia, China, France and the United Kingdom. 
Three rounds of secret, informal and non-binding straw polls have revealed a closely contested race among the candidates, according to diplomatic sources cited in reports.
In the first round, held on July 30, Rebeca Grynspan led the field with 10 "encourage" votes, followed by Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett with nine and Rafael Grossi with seven.
The second round, held on Aug. 21, saw a change at the top, with Rodrigues-Birkett receiving eight "encourage" votes, while Grynspan and Grossi each received seven.
Grynspan regained the lead in the third round, held on September 18, securing nine "encourage" votes, while Rodrigues-Birkett received eight.
The straw polls provide an initial indication of the level of support or opposition each candidate commands within the Security Council. However, they do not constitute formal votes or a final result, and positions expressed by Council members during the process may change as consultations continue.
Two considerations have emerged as notable factors in the race, although neither constitutes a binding rule: the gender and geographic origin of the next secretary-general.
No woman has served as UN secretary-general since the organization was established in 1945, while four of the seven current candidates are women.
There have also been calls for the next secretary-general to come from Latin America and the Caribbean, based on the principle of geographic rotation, which is customary but not legally binding. If both considerations were to converge in a single candidate, the United Nations could, for the first time in its history, be led by a woman from the Latin America and Caribbean region.
The role of the UN secretary-general has expanded over more than eight decades, extending far beyond administrative responsibilities to become one of the world's most complex political and diplomatic positions.
The United Nations describes the secretary-general as combining the roles of diplomat, advocate, international civil servant and chief executive. The secretary-general also serves as a symbol of the organization's ideals and as a voice for the world's peoples, particularly the poor and vulnerable, while seeking to strike a delicate balance between what the international community can do and what it should do.
The UN secretary-general is not the president of the world, does not command an army, and cannot impose peace on warring parties or sanctions on states. The secretary-general also has no vote in the Security Council. Yet when war breaks out, a ceasefire collapses or channels of communication between adversaries shut down, attention often turns to the UN chief, whose role includes opening closed doors, particularly when dialogue has stalled and communication between opposing parties has broken down.
The secretary-general can employ what are known as good offices, engaging directly with the leaders of the parties involved, dispatching envoys, proposing mediators, identifying areas of potential understanding and working to keep diplomatic channels open between parties that may be unwilling to publicly acknowledge that they are negotiating with their adversaries.
Article 99 of the UN Charter gives the secretary-general one of the organization's most important political tools: the authority to bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter that, in the secretary-general's view, may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security.
Whoever is chosen as the next secretary-general will inherit a wide range of international crises and challenges, foremost among them the war in Gaza and the Palestinian issue, the war in Ukraine, the crisis in Sudan and conflicts and instability in various parts of Africa. The next UN chief will also face regional tensions and nuclear threats at a time when the Security Council itself is deeply divided.
The incoming secretary-general will also lead an organization facing severe financial constraints and will confront a fundamental question over how to make the United Nations less costly without making it less capable, particularly as humanitarian needs expand and displacement and hunger crises worsen while resources available to international organizations continue to shrink.
In addition, the new secretary-general will begin the term with only four years remaining before the 2030 deadline for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. This will place the early years of the new term under pressure to preserve as much of the international development agenda as possible, while also opening discussions on the shape of the global agenda beyond 2030.
The new secretary-general will also have to address a growing range of issues involving artificial intelligence, climate change, water, food, energy and migration. These challenges are no longer separate from international security but have increasingly become integral to it.
In a world marked by rising conflicts and wars and declining trust, the first task of the 10th UN secretary-general may be simple to articulate but immense in significance: to demonstrate that, more than 80 years after its creation, and despite setbacks in addressing numerous crises, the United Nations remains the broadest international framework available to the international community for discussing differences and competing demands and seeking solutions away from of conflict. (QNA)