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TWN
Info Service on WTO and Trade Issues (Feb21/05) Geneva, 5 Feb (D. Ravi Kanth) – The path is finally being cleared for the appointment of Nigeria’s former finance minister Ms Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as the new WTO director-general, after her opponent South Korean trade minister Ms Yoo Myung-hee withdrew from the race on 5 February. Significantly, Ms Yoo’s decision to withdraw her bid to head the WTO came a day after a telephonic conversation on 4 February between South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in and the US President Joe Biden, said a person familiar with the development. “Considering various factors, including the need to revitalize the role of the WTO, Yoo has decided to renounce her [candidature],” South Korea’s Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy said in a statement, according to a Yonhap News Agency report. “South Korea will continue to make various contributions to rebuild and enhance multilateralism. It will especially make efforts to play leading roles in global issues, including reforming the WTO, as well as the digital economy and climate change,” the report added. On 3 February, Nigeria’s former finance minister Ms Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said that she is relying on “strategic patience” for her appointment as the WTO director-general, hoping for a positive decision by the Biden administration to reverse the block placed by the previous Trump administration. In the normal course, Ms Yoo would have withdrawn from the DG race in early December, and she apparently conveyed her decision to the former US Trade Representative Ambassador Robert Lighthizer in a one-on-one meeting in December, said a person familiar with the meeting. South Korea is not the country that has vetoed Ms Okonjo-Iweala’s appointment, the person said. “It’s a little bit out of my hands,” Ms Okonjo-Iweala said during a virtual program sponsored by the Center for Global Development held in Washington DC on 3 February. “I have to be very patient. I call it strategic patience,” she continued, according to a report in the Washington Trade Daily on 4 February. Ms Okonjo-Iweala said she understands that the new President needs time to “settle down a bit.” It is an open secret that the former Nigerian finance minister’s prospects for being appointed as the WTO’s DG have substantially improved after the Biden administration took office a fortnight ago, said a person familiar with the development. The Trump administration had blocked her appointment on grounds that she lacked experience in global trade. Instead, the former US Trade Representative Ambassador Robert Lighthizer pressed for appointing the Korean trade minister Ms Yoo Myung-hee on grounds that she possessed substantial experience in global trade for almost 25 years. It remains to be seen whether the General Council chair, Ambassador David Walker of New Zealand, will convene a special General Council meeting this month or wait till early March, said a trade envoy, who asked not to be quoted. Meanwhile, in his address to the State Department on 4 February, US President Joe Biden declared China as the “most serious competitor”. The US will “confront China’s economic abuses, counter its aggressive, coercive action, to push back on China’s attack on human rights, intellectual property and global governance.” “If we invest in ourselves and our people, if we fight to ensure that American businesses are positioned to compete and win on the global stage, if the rules of international trade aren’t stacked against us, if our workers and intellectual property are protected, then there is no country on Earth – not China or any other country on Earth – that can match us,” he said.
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