At the
outset, allow me to extend my congratulations and
those of the Togolese people to Mr. Joseph Deiss on his
election as President of the General Assembly at its
sixty-fifth session and to wish him every success in the
accomplishment of his great task. My delegation will
spare no effort in working at his side towards the
successful achievement of his mandate. Like him, we
are firmly convinced that the values that lie at the heart
of the United Nations remain very relevant today to
successfully meeting the challenges facing humankind.
I also congratulate his predecessor for his
invaluable efforts during his term of office to advance
the agenda of the General Assembly in many diverse
and different areas, in particular those of peace and
security, human rights and the development of our
nations.
I would like to renew my personal support and
that of my country to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
for the dynamism he has shown over the course of the
past four years at the head of the United Nations. I also
take this opportunity to congratulate him on the
important report that he introduced to us yesterday on
the work of the Organization (A/65/1).
The theme that the President of the General
Assembly has proposed for the current session,
“Reaffirming the central role of the United Nations in
global governance”, eloquently translates the
aspirations of our States, particularly the developing
countries. The theme implies that the United Nations
must remain at the heart of multilateralism and that the
institutions of our Organization must therefore be
reconsidered, beginning with the long-awaited reform
of the Security Council, in order to bring greater
democracy and equity and, above all, to respond more
effectively to the many challenges to our world.
In its own search for better governance and the
well-being of its people, my country, Togo, has
tirelessly and irreversibly continued its march towards
greater democracy, freedom and justice in an
environment of peace and stability. Seeking to turn the
page once and for all on the dark years of our
democratic deficit, the Head of State has established a
new policy of openness. In August 2006, this
commendable initiative led to the signing of the
Comprehensive Political Agreement among the main
political actors in Togo and to the establishment of a
Government of national unity and the holding in
October 2007 of legislative elections that were
universally recognized as free and transparent and, for
the first time, without violence. These elections, which
established a pluralist National Assembly, are without a
doubt the emblem of our democratic renaissance.
The Government has since initiated political and
economic reforms leading to the adoption of a statute
of the opposition and of a law on the financing of
political parties; the consensus appointment of
members of the National Independent Electoral
Commission; and the creation of a security force for
the presidential elections, the members of which are
trained according to universally recognized standards
and have maintained security throughout the electoral
process in an exemplary fashion. All of these efforts
naturally allowed Togo to hold, on 4 March 2010, a
presidential election that was democratic, peaceful and
widely praised by the international community.
I reiterate here the profound gratitude of the
Government and people of Togo to all of our partners,
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to regional and international institutions, and to the
friendly countries that supported us throughout the
electoral process, making it a success and a good
example. Our gratitude goes to the United Nations for
its many forms of support throughout the process of
democratization and consolidation.
I would also encourage the United Nations to
invest even more in preventive democracy by,
inter alia, beginning to envision mechanisms that could
lead all parties to accept the results of elections that are
recognized as credible and transparent by the
international community. That is a challenge we have
to take up, particularly in our young democracies, and
especially the African democracies, so that the post-
electoral period is no longer a nightmare or a source of
division among our peaceful populations.
Notwithstanding his outstanding victory, and
faithful to his policy of reaching out to his opponents,
President Faure Gnassingbé appealed to all persons of
good will to take part in the building of the Togolese
nation. It was in this vein that an historic political
agreement was concluded in May between the
presidential majority and the Union des Forces de
Changement, the main opposition party in Togo, which,
with seven ministerial posts, has for the first time
joined a Government after 40 years of political
fighting.
Moreover, the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation
Commission, which seeks to promote reconciliation
among the Togolese people by shedding light on the
political violence that took place in Togo between 1958
and 2005, is currently in the depositions phase. My
country will work tirelessly to consolidate the
achievements of democracy and peace, while devoting
increasing efforts and energy to the achievement of the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in order to
bring human and sustainable development to the entire
population. Now that Togo has reconciled with itself, I
have faith in our capacity to fully renew our relations
with all of our bilateral and multilateral partners and to
open up new horizons in the vast field of solidarity that
is international cooperation.
Although there are some positive signs of the
recovery of the world economy, it is no exaggeration to
say that the path to stabilization and the suppression of
the disturbing effects of the crisis is still long, perilous
and uncertain.
The new problem of climate change has brought
in its wake catastrophes linked to rainfall phenomena,
such as floods, drought and landslides. Without a
doubt, all of these phenomena will have a negative
impact on global economic growth in general and,
more specifically, a tragic effect on the least developed
countries in particular. Despite this threat, we still
hesitate to reach agreement, as was demonstrated
recently by the Copenhagen Conference on innovative
and proactive strategies to significantly reduce
greenhouse gas emissions, on the one hand, and, on the
other hand, to pursue discussions to adopt as soon as
possible a schedule for concluding a new agreement to
succeed the Kyoto Protocol. The time for speeches is
over; the time to act is now.
The High-level Plenary Meeting that we have just
held here on the implementation of the Millennium
Development Goals revealed once again the intrinsic
link between aid and development, on the one hand,
and development and political will, on the other, at the
national and international levels. The modest results
my country has achieved with respect to the MDGs
could have been better, and we would have been closer
to attaining them within the deadlines set if we had not
been deprived for far too many years of the precious
help afforded by development aid.
The peaceful political climate being enjoyed by
my country will also enable us to effectively pursue the
improvement of the management of our public finances
so that we are able to devote more domestic resources
to achieving the MDGs. However, the efforts
undertaken by poor countries to consolidate the bases
of sustainable development will be a genuine success
only if developed countries provide them with their
various forms of assistance and if they honour their
commitments. Let us not close our eyes to this fact. We
need better aid in terms of quantity and quality.
Although the international community can
welcome the fact that the number of armed conflicts in
the world has fallen, we cannot forget that several
peacekeeping operations of the United Nations are still
under way. That is undeniable proof that we are still far
from the ideal of international peace and security that
the founding fathers of the United Nations envisaged.
Civil wars and terrorism continue to plunge many
families into mourning throughout the world. More
than wars, terrorism today is the most murderous form
of violence inflicted upon people because it attacks
indiscriminately, killing children, men, women and the
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elderly. The eradication of terrorism in all its forms is a
long-term task and the responsibility above all of
States and the international community acting in
solidarity. They are obligated to find the best way to
fight this phenomenon. In this regard, prevention,
protection, prosecution and punishment, as well as
international cooperation, must remain the main focus
of State action.
While Member States struggle to find a definition
of terrorism in order to better fight it, the scourge is
affecting an increasing number of countries because of
the support that terrorists receive, particularly from
drug trafficking networks. In West Africa, all leaders
have become aware of the threat posed by drug
trafficking and are engaged in a fight to the death
against the phenomenon. I call on wealthy countries to
help fight drug trafficking in my subregion in order to
prevent it from becoming an unstable zone of
unrestrained violence.
The purposes and principles for which the United
Nations Organization was created are noble, but
65 years after its birth the work that remains to be done
is immense because the social situation of the
inhabitants of the planet does not always follow the
development that our world has achieved. Poverty and
destitution are not mere words; they are oppressive
realities experienced day by day. They lead to violence,
instability, conflicts and other scourges that we, today,
are not fighting successfully. Only international
solidarity will allow us to overcome the evils of this
world.