The United Nations
embodies multilateralism. It is living testimony of the
intergovernmental process at work. Samoa’s
membership of the United Nations is grounded on the
promise of the hope, equality and justice the United
Nations offers the Member States, irrespective of their
economic, political or military strengths. Looking
back, our Organization has not lived up to the lofty
goals enshrined in its Charter. Its credibility has been
tarnished and undermined, and its performance
questioned at times.
Yet, those perceived failings of our Organization
are of our own making when we allow the vested
interests of a few to take precedence over the urgent
and deserving needs of the majority; when we accept
flawed perceptions that certain issues, States and
regions are more important than others, distorting the
world’s focus and the allocation of resources; when we
turn a blind eye and let the numerical superiority of
groups or the importance of some stakeholders
frustrate informed discussions of critical issues to score
points and achieve symbolic wins that help no one in
the long run; and when the long list of broken promises
and unfulfilled undertakings couched in eloquent yet
meaningless rhetoric creates frustration and mistrust
among Member States.
The end result is that if no one takes
responsibility, the future of the United Nations will be
in doubt and the cost to the world incalculable. We
have no one but ourselves to blame for any deficit in
the credibility of our Organization. What we urgently
need is a collective sense of trust and commitment to
its Charter. Only then will the United Nations remain
relevant and regain the confidence of our Members.
There is too much at stake for the world to just sit
idly by. Strong global leadership is at a premium.
Governments must yield not to vested interests and
expediency, but because it is the ethical and the just
thing to do.
That was my message from this rostrum last year,
and I am happy to restate it again today. No Member
State is too powerful or too small not to be part of the
solution of making the United Nations an agent of
change and a beacon of hope during these challenging
times. And no contribution is too trivial or unimportant
not to matter. For States in leadership positions, the
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ideal is to lead with humility, fairness and a kind heart.
The world expects nothing less. Leadership and
responsibility are, after all, one and the same.
Clearly, Member States can only do so much. We
need a committed Secretariat that is aware of and
sensitive to the needs of the people it serves. That is a
non-negotiable prerequisite. Samoa supports the
Secretary-General’s vision of creating a professional
career service that is flexible and mobile enough to
allow for quick and positive responses to the diverse
demands of Member States. The need for the United
Nations to deliver as one entity cannot be
overemphasized. It adds value and quality to the
process, eliminates waste, minimizes overlaps and
ensures that the scarce resources entrusted to its care
are used optimally to supplement Members States’
hard-earned efforts.
Right now our world is facing a difficult and
troubled time. As members of the global community,
our futures are inextricably linked. For Samoa, the
small size of our country, its isolation from the major
markets and permanent vulnerability to climate change
are factors beyond our control. Yet even as a least
developed small island nation that has made little or no
contribution to the causes of today’s crises, Samoa is
not shielded from their immediate negative impact and
long-term consequences.
Global crises, as we know from bitter experience
with global warming, energy and food prices, and now
with the mayhem in financial markets that threatens to
engulf the world, affect all our nations irrespective of
whether we contributed to those crises or not.
This is why, in spite of shortcomings in the
Organization, the United Nations remains the only
viable institution that draws all the nations of our
world together. However, the need to revitalize the
General Assembly and to reform the Security Council
has been obvious for many years. In the case of the
Security Council, as long as its current composition
and rules ignore today’s realities, it will continue to
struggle to effectively carry out its intended tasks, as
we have seen it do over many years.
Samoa remains firm in its position that the
permanent and non-permanent membership categories
of the Security Council should be expanded. Member
States with legitimate credentials should be encouraged to
stake their claims. Importantly, the intergovernmental
process should commence in earnest during the current
session to bring finality to an issue that has taxed
Members States’ patience and endurance for over a
decade and a half.
At the very minimum, the unanimous support of
the current permanent members of the Security Council
is a must. We hope, therefore, that candidate States and
permanent members will reach out to each other in
good faith and set aside the barriers that continue to
frustrate the reforms to the Security Council that we all
know must be made.
One observation that has been made over many
years is that there seems to be indifference, whether
intended or not, on the part of some of the leader
nations of our Organization towards small and
economically weak States, which, while they observe
good governance and practice sound economic
management, are nevertheless faced with the constant
struggle to sustain and maintain the hard-won gains on
those fronts.
Paradoxically, the only time those struggling
States get noticed is when they are tottering on the
brink or in the process of becoming failed States. By
then, the cost in salvage action and remedial
programmes is enormous. Therefore, the willingness of
leader nations to listen and to try and understand early
on the problems of States struggling to sustain good
governance and economic management would go a
long way towards creating effective partnerships,
deploying scarce resources efficiently, and engendering
goodwill and trust in the process.
Troubled spots around the world are on the rise,
including in our own Pacific region. Some are
occasioned by outside forces and influences, and others
through domestically induced factors. Notwithstanding
our differences, we all aspire to the same values in life.
Hence, we must heed the lessons of history and provide
appropriate encouragement and interventions to help
States restore good governance and abide by the
principles of democracy.
Yesterday’s high-level meeting on the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) was a timely
reminder, not of what we have achieved by the midway
point, but what decisive actions must be taken urgently
if the time-bound targets set at the dawn of the new
millennium are to be met. Samoa participated in the
recent Accra meeting on aid effectiveness, which
further refined the pathways to the MDGs review just
concluded and the International Conference on
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Financing for Development in Doha in November
2008.
Our strategic plan for 2008 to 2012 is a
comprehensive development framework linked to the
budget process for the implementation of the MDGs,
with strategic targeting of those goals on which we
have seen minimal progress through priority resource
allocation.
We are grateful to the Governments of the
People’s Republic of China and the United Kingdom
for their support through debt relief. Similarly, we want
to acknowledge the innovative partnerships in which
we are engaged with our development partners, both
old and new, giving us full ownership of the process in
our quest to achieve as many of the MDGs as we
possibly can.
In September 2007, during the 2007 South Pacific
Games in Samoa, my Government worked closely with
the United Nations system and others to promote the
achievement of the MDGs. One innovative way of
using sports as a vehicle to effect change in behaviour
and to relay development messages was the installation
of a solar-powered “MDG scoreboard” in front of a
Government building to monitor national progress
towards the MDGs.
Climate change continues to play a pivotal role in
the decisions of the leaders in our region. Our Pacific
Islands Forum meeting in August 2008 adopted the
Niue Declaration on Climate Change. Our Forum
communiqué, issued at the same summit, highlighted
the vulnerability of Pacific small island developing
States to the impacts of climate change. The European
Union and the Pacific Islands Forum Troika agreed last
week to work together to highlight the ongoing
vulnerability of Pacific islands to the impacts of sea-
level rise. Our representatives to the United Nations
are working with like-minded countries to bring to the
fore the security implications of climate change.
In total, those efforts and partnerships should
convince those in denial that climate change is real. Its
effects have already been felt by some of our Pacific
island States, and for some low-lying islands climate
change is an existential issue and their long-term
survivability is at stake.
Only through selfless and concerted efforts by all
countries, led by the major greenhouse gas emitters,
can we have a fighting chance of lessening the
destructive impact of climate change and enhancing the
chances of a credible post-Kyoto agreement beyond
2012. To reach that goal, the Bali Road Map — with its
four pillars of adaptation, mitigation, finance and
technology — should be supported both in word and in
deed.
The unpredictable weather patterns of recent
times, affecting all regions of the world, are a sober
reminder of our limitations as human beings against
the force of natural elements no matter how good and
technologically sound our preparations are. We need a
global response if we are to succeed. Samoa was
pleased, therefore, to see Australia take its place as a
State party to the Kyoto Protocol at the Bali meeting.
We remain optimistic that, either through a change of
heart or through new circumstances, other countries
will join the Kyoto Protocol to strengthen the
implementation regimes of the Convention.
I mentioned last year the offer of the United
Nations system to establish an inter-agency climate
change centre in our country for coordinated support to
Pacific island countries and regional organizations for
climate change mitigation, adaptation and disaster risk
reduction. Given the clear importance to the Pacific
region of the project, Samoa has allocated land — 16
acres in all — on which to locate the centre and awaits
the provision of the necessary resources by the United
Nations so that the facility, which is already public
knowledge in the region, can be constructed.
Samoa continues to support United Nations
peacekeeping efforts worldwide. Small as we are,
Samoan police continue to serve side by side with
officers from other countries in Liberia, the Sudan and
Timor-Leste as part of our ongoing commitment.
Within the Pacific region, our solidarity in confronting
the challenges facing our neighbours ensures a
guaranteed Samoan police presence in the Regional
Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands under the
umbrella of the Pacific Islands Forum.
A durable peace settlement in the Middle East
continues to elude us, but that does not constitute
grounds to be pessimistic. We should support every
effort to create conditions conducive to the creation of
an independent Palestinian State alongside a secure and
safe State of Israel.
Finally, those bent on creating fear and panic
throughout the world will stop at nothing to achieve
their aims. We must not be held hostage to their
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devious designs. Individually and collectively, we must
step up our efforts to combat the threat of international
terrorism in its many manifestations. No country can
succeed on its own. Only by working collaboratively
can we be successful.