KOFI ANNAN

A Global Icon

Kofi Annan is a former United Nations Organization former secretary general, he was very dynamic and had great sympathy for people who are vulnerable in society.

The Asantehene bestowed the highest honour of the Asanteman Land on Kofi Annan as the "Bosomuru".

It is an honour bestowed on only the Ashanti King.

This name came from a very rich history and there is a sword named Bosomuru. This sword is an enchanted sword which is under the custody of Bosomuru King.

BIOGRAPHY

Early years and family

Kofi Annan was born to Victoria and Henry Reginald Annan in the Kofandros section of Kumasi, Ghana. He is a twin, and his twin sister Efua Atta, died in 1991, shares the middle name 'Atta', which in Fante means 'twin'. both of his grandfathers and his uncle were tribal chiefs. His father was half Asante and half Fante; his mother was Fante. Annan's father worked for a long period as an export manager for the Lever Brothers cocoa company. Annan is married to Nane Maria Annan, a Swedish lawyer and artist who is the half-niece of Raoul Wallenberg. He has two children, Kojo and Ama, from his previous marriage to Nigerian Titi Alakija. He and Alakija divorced in the late 1970s. Nane Annan also has one child, Nina Cronstedt de Groot, from a previous marriage.

Education

From 1954 to 1957, Annan attended Mfantsipim secondary school, a Methodist boarding school in Cape Coast founded in the 1870s. In 1957, the year Annan graduated from Mfantsipim, was the year Ghana became the first British colony in Sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence. In 1958, Annan began studying for a degree in 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 at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, United States, in 1961. Annan then studied at the Graduate Institute of International Studies (Institut universitaire des hautes études internationales IUHEI) in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1961–62, later attending the MIT Sloan School of Management (1971–72) Sloan Fellows programme and receiving a Master of Science (M.S.) degree from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

LINGUISTIC SKILLS

Annan is fluent in English, French, Kru, other dialects of Akan, and other African languages. Early career In 1962, Annan started working as a Budget Officer for the World Health Organization, an agency of the United Nations. From 1974 to 1976, Annan worked as the Director of Tourism in Ghana. Following that, he returned to work for the United Nations as an Assistant Secretary-General in three consecutive positions: Human Resources Management and Security Coordinator from 1987 to 1990, Programme Planning, Budget and Finance, and Controller from 1990 to 1992, and Peacekeeping Operations from March 1993 to February 1994. In his book Shake Hands with the Devil:

The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda, ex-General Roméo Dallaire who was force commander of the UNAMIR claims that Annan has been overly passive in his response to the 1994 Tutsi genocide in Rwanda. Gen. Dallaire explicitly stated that the then Undersecretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations held back UN troops from intervening to settle the conflict and from providing more logistic and material support. For example, he claimed that Annan failed to provide any responses to Dallaire's repeated faxes asking him for access to a weapons depository, something that could have helped defend the Tutsis. Dallaire concedes however that Annan was a man whom he found extremely "committed" to the founding principles of the United Nations.

Annan was then an Under-Secretary-General until October 1995, when he was made a Special Representative of the Secretary-General to the former Yugoslavia, serving for five months in this capacity and returning to his duties as Under-Secretary-General in April 1996. Secretary-General of the United Nations On December 13, 1996, Annan was selected by the United Nations Security Council to be Secretary-General, and was confirmed four days later by vote of the General Assembly. Annan took the oath of office without delay, starting his first term as Secretary-General on January 1, 1997.

UNITED NATIONS POSITION

Annan replaced outgoing Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt, becoming the first person from a black African nation to serve as Secretary-General. Annan's tenure as Secretary-General was renewed on January 1, 2002, in an unusual deviation from informal policy. The office usually rotates among the continents, with two terms each; since Annan's predecessor Boutros-Ghali was also an African, Annan normally would have served only one term, indicating Annan's unusual popularity. Mark Malloch Brown succeeded Louise Frechette as Annan's Deputy Secretary-General in April 2006. In April 2001, the Secretary-General issued a five-point "Call to Action" to address the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Annan sees this pandemic as his "personal priority" as Secretary-General and in life in general. He proposed the establishment of a Global AIDS and Health Fund to stimulate increased spending needed to help developing countries confront the HIV/AIDS crisis.

On December 10, 2001, Annan and the United Nations were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, "for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world". During the buildup to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Annan called on the United States and the United Kingdom not to invade without the support of the United Nations. In a September 2004 interview on the BBC, Annan was asked about the legal authority for the invasion, and responded, "from our point of view and from the Charter point of view it was illegal." Annan supports sending a UN peacekeeping mission to Darfur, Sudan, and is working with the government of Sudan to accept a transfer of power from the African Union peacekeeping mission to a UN one.

Annan is also working with several Arab and Muslim countries on women's rights and other topics. Since 1998, Annan has convened an annual UN Security Council Retreat with 15 States representatives of the Council at the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF) Conference Centre at the Rockefeller family estate at Pocantico (see Kykuit), which is sponsored by both the RBF and the UN. . He is also a strong supporter and guest of the family's Asia Society in New York. On September 19, 2006, Annan gave a farewell address in anticipation of his retirement on December 31. In the speech he outlined three major problems of "an unjust world economy, world disorder, and widespread contempt for human rights and the rule of law" which he believes "have not resolved, but sharpened" during his time as Secretary-General. He also pointed to violence in Africa, and the Arab-Israeli conflict as two major issues warranting attention. UN controversies during Annan's tenure Lubbers sexual harassment investigation In June 2004,

Annan was given a copy of the Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) report on the complaint of sexual harassment, abuse of authority, and retaliation against Ruud Lubbers, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, and sexual harassment and misconduct as well against Werner Blatter, Director of UNHCR Personnel by a long-serving staff member. The investigation report found Ruud Lubbers guilty of sexual harassment and no mention was made publicly of the other charge against a senior official or the two subsequent complaints she filed later that year. In the course of the official investigation, Lubbers wrote a letter that some speculate was a threat to the female worker who had brought the charges of misconduct. However, on July 15, 2004, Lubbers was declared innocent by Kofi Annan. His decision only lasted until November when OIOS issued its annual report to the UN General Assembly noting it has found Lubbers guilty. Widely reported in the media, these events served to weaken Annan's position.

On November 17, 2004, Annan accepted a report clearing UN Under-Secretary-General for Internal Oversight Services Dileep Nair of graft and sexual harassment charges, some viewed as retaliation against Nair for supporting the complainant in the Lubbers affair. Still, clearance was not viewed favorably by some UN staff in New York, leading to extensive debate on November 19.

Administration of the Oil-for-Food Programme In December 2004, reports surfaced that the Secretary-General's son Kojo received payments from the Swiss company Cotecna Inspection SA, which won a lucrative contract under the UN Oil-for-Food Programme. Kofi Annan called for an investigation into this matter. The Independent Inquiry Committee into The United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme was appointed by Annan and led by former US Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, in spite of the latter's strong ideological ties to the UN as director of the United Nations Association of the United States of America.

In his first interview with the Inquiry Committee, Annan denied having had a meeting with Cotecna. Later in the inquiry he recalled that he had met with Cotecna's chief executive Elie-Georges Massey twice. In a final report issued on October 27, the committee exonerated Kofi Annan of any illegal actions, but found fault with the UN management structure and the Security Council oversight. It strongly recommended a new position of Chief Operating Officer to handle the fiscal and administrative responsibilities which currently fall to the Secretary General's office. The report listed the companies, both Western and Middle Eastern, who illegally benefited from the programme. Some believe the committee and its outcome to have been politically motivated. Conflict between the United States and the United Nations Kofi Annan supported his deputy Secretary-General Mark Malloch Brown, who openly criticized the United States media in a speech on June 6, 2006: '

The prevailing practice of seeking to use the U.N. almost by stealth as a diplomatic tool while failing to stand up against its domestic critics is simply not sustainable...You will lose the U.N. one way or another.' US ambassador John R. Bolton said to Annan on the phone: 'I've known you since 1989 and I'm telling you this is the worst mistake by a senior U.N. official that I have seen in that entire time.' Annan's recommendations for U.N. reform On March 21, 2005, Annan presented a progress report, In Larger Freedom, to the UN General Assembly. Annan recommended Security Council expansion and a host of other UN reforms. On March 7, 2006, he presented to the General Assembly his proposals for a fundamental overhaul of the United Nations Secretariat. The reform report is entitled: "Investing in the United Nations, For a Stronger Organization Worldwide".

KOFI ANNAN'S RETIREMENT FROM ACTIVE SERVICE (As UN Chief)

FAREWELL ADDRESS

On 19 September 2006, Annan gave a farewell address to world leaders gathered at the UN headquartersin New York in anticipation of his retirement on 31 December. In the speech, he outlined three major problems of "an unjust world economy, world disorder, and widespread contempt for human rights and the rule of law", which he believed "have not resolved, but sharpened" during his time as secretary-general. He also pointed to violence in Africa and the Arab–Israeli conflict as two major issues warranting attention.

On 11 December 2006, in his final speech as secretary-general, delivered a speech at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library in Independence, Missouri, Annan recalled President Truman's leadership in the founding of the United Nations. He called for the United States to return to Truman's multilateralist foreign policies and to follow Truman's doctrine that "the responsibility of the great states is to serve and not dominate the peoples of the world". He also said that the United States must maintain its commitment to human rights, "including in the struggle against terrorism".

LIFE ASSIGNMENT OF THE SON'S OF DESTINY

Like I said from the beginning his chart reflects a stellium of four planets with the Moon's south node, all in Taurus. Here we come face to face with the energy that was driving the world giant. His horoscope reflect someone with Aries on the ascendant but Taurus is intercepted in the first house with all these five planets and node inside, this Taurus indeed intercepted the personality and chose him to carry the burden of many on his shoulders. This was not an easy task but in this case a soul in this incarnation has been invited to bear this obligation and he ought to fulfill it anyway,

The pattern of Stellium is associted with another strange pattern which reflects a kind of tug of war energies. The ruler of the chart is also seen among the Stellium and connected to Jupiter the Mythical Zeus in Aquarius, a mind that is bent on finding solutions to problems a strong and positive thought graced with Divine providence reflected in Uranus conjunction to Mars (the ruler) and these two planets are favorably in trine aspect to Neptune ( the vessel, a channel). Neptune is said to be the planet of Dvinity and a symbol of a medium through which spiritual energy can be channeled and Kofi Annan indeed served as a conduit an instrument through which a sense of unity and understanding was built, of cause he was without his own faults as a human.

Chiron the element which symbolises our wound has a frictional aspect with this Neptune and therefore his weaknesses will be seen coming from that side, the side that brought him pain and suffering when he see the limitations to what he can do THE ARROW OF GOD There are many pointers or should I say symbols reflecting the hand of God behind the the thought of men who incarnate from time to time to serve the cause of humanity and Kofi Annan was one of such men. We thank God that such a man once walk and lived on the surface of the Earth and helped make the world a bit better than he met it, we see many such black leaders who gave their best for the world. This is why the world must know that all men must be treated equally no matter the colour of the skin or the language or where they come from.

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