SECRETARY-GENERAL, EMPHASIZING SYNERGY FOR EQUITABLE DEVELOPMENT, UNDERSCORES ROLE OF CIVIL SOCIETY, NGO, BUSINESS COMMUNITY
Press Release
SG/SM/6574
SECRETARY-GENERAL, EMPHASIZING SYNERGY FOR EQUITABLE DEVELOPMENT, UNDERSCORES ROLE OF CIVIL SOCIETY, NGO, BUSINESS COMMUNITY
19980526 Following is the text of Secretary-General Kofi Annan's statement at the Synergos Institute's "University for a Night" programme, held at Headquarters today:It gives me great pleasure to join you this evening and to see people from so many walks of life gathered here at the United Nations. Synergy has to some people become an overused word. But tonight, you give living expression to its reality and to its promise.
Synergy is also very much on our minds at the United Nations.
In pursuit of synergy, the United Nations is coordinating more and more with international institutions such as the World Bank, under the visionary leadership of my good friend Jim Wolfensohn.
Synergy is also why I have reached out to civil society, to non-governmental organizations and to the business community. Hank Greenberg exemplifies the new breed of executives with whom international organizations can "do business": outward-looking and fully aware that in a global environment, the business of business also includes the United Nations.
The recognition of our mutual interests springs not only from hope but also from experience.
We have learned that successful development policies must give local businesses as well as individuals a real and lasting stake in their community's prosperity. We have learned that for the fight against poverty to succeed, groups such as Synergos must be part of an alliance including governments and international organizations.
Finally, we have learned that if capitalism is to take root and succeed among the poorest and most threatened of peoples, then it must be equitable. It must prove itself as a factor that narrows and not widens the gap between rich and poor; as an agent for peaceful, progressive change and not as an instrument of inequality and injustice.
The developed world has learned the lesson that extreme poverty and immense wealth cannot exist side by side forever. Let us ensure that the same lesson is also applied to the developing world.
- 2 - Press Release SG/SM/6574 26 May 1998
It is, above all, in Africa that our commitment to development with justice will be measured. It is there that the peoples themselves will seize the opportunities that our synergies afford for peace and prosperity. It is there that they can make a difference. Recently, I visited the Mbale district of Uganda as part of a tour of central and eastern Africa. I came away with new confidence in Africa's ability to make the strides that together will form the lasting tide of progress.
In the district of Mbale, I visited a private sector promotion centre which was a joint product of our efforts and those of our development partners in the region. This centre will serve as a vital tool for the further growth of Uganda's private sector, both locally and nationally.
Mbale is a promising example of synergy. Its project will empower the individual men and, particularly important, the women of the district to take charge of their own lives by giving them the tools to create and sustain their own economy. Above all, it will help provide them with a stake in their society without which no degree of aid and no amount of hope can make the difference between poverty and opportunity in Africa. Given access to capital and management advice, we now know that the poor can create their own prosperity.
Our role, our mission is to help provide the basis for the belief that poverty can be defeated, that old enmities can be overcome and that a new beginning is possible. But we cannot and should not do it alone. Through organizations such as Synergos and with partners such as the World Bank and global business, we can maximize our impact and ensure that our message reaches as many people as possible.
I am confident that evenings such as this can produce the new ideas and the revitalized commitment that the cause of development needs. I look forward to listening to your ideas about these shared concerns.
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