WTO DG: Nigeria’s Okonjo-Iweala sole candidate as challenger withdraws

Yoo Myung-hee, the South Korean candidate to lead the World Trade Organization (WTO), has dropped out of the race, effectively opening the door for Nigeria’s Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala to become its first African leader.

In a statement, Yoo, the South Korean Trade Minister, said that she had been “in consultation with major countries such as the United States” over the consensus vote to become the next director general of the WTO.

Nigerian candidate Okonjo-Iweala had been recommended by top WTO officials to lead the Geneva body in October, after being judged to have had majority support among WTO members, but the appointment was blocked by the United States under the Trump administration.

Former US trade representative Robert Lighthizer said that her opponent, Yoo, “is a bona fide trade expert who has distinguished herself during a 25-year career as a successful trade negotiator and trade policymaker”.

Okonjo-Iweala had the key backing of China, the European Union and Japan.

Yoo’s decision may signal a softening in the Biden administration’s stance towards the WTO. At the end of January, after Biden’s inauguration, the US supported a statement calling for “the swift appointment of a new WTO director general, as well as the confirmation of the date and venue of the 12th Ministerial Conference”.

Yoo’s statement said that Seoul will “continue to contribute in various ways to strengthen the restoration of the multilateral trading system as a responsible trading powerhouse”.

At the meeting in October, WTO General Council chair David Walker said that Okonjo-Iweala was most likely to achieve consensus, having gained the backing of a sizeable majority of WTO members.

“One delegation could not support the candidacy of Dr Ngozi and said they would continue to support the South Korean minister [Yoo Myung-hee], that delegation was the USA,” WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell said at the time.

China also took the floor at the same meeting to say that it “supported the process of the troika and that the process had been well-run and they respect the outcome”, Rockwell said, the implication being that China supported Okonjo-Iweala.

In total, 27 delegations took the floor to support the Nigerian‘s candidacy, with only the US differing.

This came after a formal “confessionals” process conducted by the WTO’s troika – the three ambassadors that head up its core divisions – who spent days gleaning member preferences.

Brazilian Roberto Azevedo, who was the sixth director general of the WTO, stepped down at the end of August, a year before the end of his second term. He was first appointed in September 2013 before being re-elected for a second four-year term in February 2017.

After Azevedo announced his decision to step down in May, candidates were put forward by their respective governments to become the new director general of the WTO once the deadline had expired in early July.

In mid-September, Mexico’s Jesus Seade, Egypt’s Abdel-Hamid Mamdouh and Moldova’s Tudor Ulianovschi failed to receive enough support to move into the second stage.

Okonjo-Iweala and Yoo eventually advanced to the final stage, the WTO announced in early October after Britain’s Liam Fox, Saudi Arabia’s Mohammad Maziad Al-Tuwaijri and Kenya’s Amina Mohamed also failed receive enough support.