YouSaid · the spoken record

Gounden

lines on the record

19

first

2005-09-20

most recent

2019-02-27

sittings or episodes

2

sources

un-security-council

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1. “But will the people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo again contribute only their materials and muscle, or will they also benefit from the fourth industrial revolution? They will make one of the largest contributions to the fourth industrial revolution with the minerals they possess, which are vital to the revolution. Unless Council members take collective action so that each representative here today exercises national interest through the global responsibility the Chamber demands, they will not silence the guns. They will silence only their powerful voices.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

2. “Will they provide more resources for conflict prevention and peacebuilding and for building local and national capacities for conflict prevention and management so that women, young people, Government leaders, religious leaders, business people and others can all be trained to manage conflicts at their source and prevent the escalation of those conflicts? Will they ensure that their Member States encourage their private sectors to turn Africa's extractive industries into productive industries, while ensuring that competitive beneficiation benefits local employment and eliminates poverty and inequality? We have said much recently, at the World Economic Forum and in this one, about the fourth industrial revolution.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

3. “Urban conflicts that are badly managed will result in higher levels of civilian casualties and make Governments that lose control over law and order become more authoritarian. That cycle will have a negative effect on development, thereby creating a new wave of internally displaced people and political refugees. That is no longer a prognosis. It is today's reality. I know that Council members adopted a resolution today (resolution 2457 (2019), but what will they do beyond that? Will they summon the political will of their member States to halt the flow of illicit weapons, almost all of which are not produced in Africa?”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

4. “That is why we, Africa, said by 2020, because we knew the urgency of silencing the guns in the light ofimpending conflicts. The threats posed by terrorism, criminal syndicates and separatist movements will continue to challenge our collective expertise as our Governments fail to exercise sovereign control over their entire territories. However, they will be even more challenged in urban areas, Where they generally exercise sovereign control but fail to deliver the essential social goods because of a failure to transform their economies; because of poor or non-existent leadership and governance; because of corruption and because they are just overwhelmed at times with challenges. Our prognosis five years ago was that the theatre of conflict would shift to urban areas over the next two decades.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

5. “The main reason is that skills development and employment creation have not been successful because there has not been a fundamental transformation in the structure of Africa's economies for decades. Most African countries remain largely subsistence agricultural economies, which have made little to no progress in moving towards an industrial or services economy. That occurs amid an exponentially growing population that is rapidly urbanizing into unplanned cities that offer no prospects for proper housing, health care, education, sanitation, water and so on. That is the main challenge in Africa today. Introduce guns into the equation and you light the proverbial time bomb waiting to explode. That is why we must silence the guns today.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

6. “In the meantime, protracted conflict ranging from violent street protest to civil war and from radicalized terror insurgencies to criminal insurgencies will characterize large parts of the continent. Robust mitigation, including silencing the guns, has to be an immediate priority if we are to arrest the violence and conflict and allow socioeconomic transformation to take place. Anything short of that will result in the gradual collapse of law and order and a deterioration into civil war that will push Africa's transformation even further back. The deep structural challenges I speak of are not new. We are all aware that the vast majority of countries in Africa have not dealt with poverty, unemployment and inequality. We have made some progress, but we are still steeped in poverty, unemployment and inequality.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

7. “However, today it is not important to debate the deadline, but more important to debate the modalities for silencing the guns. This debate on 27 February 2019, a year before the seventy-fifth anniversary of the founding of the United Nations, can be meaningful only if it recognizes that an initiative like Silencing the Guns by 2020 is merely a mitigation tool that, in the absence of good governance and the urgent transformation of the structural drivers of conflicts, will be meaningless. Many parts of Africa are reaching a dangerous tipping point, and we are currently in a race against time. Transformation to deal with the root causes and the deep structural challenges will take from 20 to 40 years to address.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

8. “It might then be asked: Why do we continue to see the persistence of conflicts in parts of Somalia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the emergence of a South Sudan and Libyan civil war, an increasingly ungoverned Sahel region and violent street protests across many relatively stable countries in Africa, including my own country, South Africa? In this context of emerging new conflicts, can we silence the guns by 2020? The answer is a resounding "no". Were the aspiration and vision correct? The answer must be a resounding, "yes". While explaining the 2020 deadline during the October 2018 high-level workshop in Addis Ababa on the Silencing the Guns by 2020 initiative Mr. Lamamra made the point that, "In deciding the deadline, there was a need to balance seriousness and realism".”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

9. “There is no doubt that huge progress in the area of peace and security has been made over the past quarter of a century in Africa, both in creating institutions and developing knowledge, skills and expertise to resolve conflicts. Our own institution, ACCORD - a specialized conflict-management organization - has trained more than 20,000 people in Africa, many of whom now occupy high office as presidents, ministers, senior Government officials, military generals and civil-society leaders. We have just been ranked by the annual Global Go To Think Tank Index Report of the University of Pennsylvania as one of the top 100 thinks tanks in the world, and the first in Africa. We are still learning, but we do not lack structures, skills, expertise or experience in Africa.”

   2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

10. “I will point out shortly why today's open debate is so timely and why Africa's time is running out fast. Many conflicts in Africa have been resolved over the past two decades, starting with my own country, South Africa, and its negotiated settlement, which culminated in its first democratic elections, held in 1994. We have since seen a wave of conflicts resolved through negotiations, including in Angola, Mozambique, the Sudan/South-Sudan, Madagascar, Liberia and Sierra Leone, and recently Ethiopia/Eritrea and the Central African Republic. Those were all seemingly intractable conflicts, but they were resolved through negotiation.”

    2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

11. “Over the past 27 years, Africa has made huge progress in evolving a peace and security architecture that started with a fledgling conflict-management centre at the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and has today evolved into the African Peace and Security Architecture of the African Union. As the African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD), our organization has been involved with the OAU since 1993 under the guidance of then OAU Secretary- General Salim Ahmed Salim, and we have consistently worked with, and contributed to every incarnation of the mechanism, inclusive of its current form. All of us who were involved, including Ambassador Lamamra, have learned a lot, but, unfortunately, conflicts do not remain static. Consequently, we have been, and continue to be, on a steep learning curve.”

    2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

12. “Mr. Gounden: I thank you, Mr. President, for inviting me to address the Security Council at this open debate on silencing the guns. Let me take this opportunity to congratulate the Government of the Republic of Equatorial Guinea for attaining the high office of the presidency of the Security Council for the first time in the country's 50-year history of independence. I would also like to congratulate you and your Government, Sir, for using this seat ofpower to focus on one of our major priorities in Africa - the prevention, management and resolution of violent conflict in all its manifestations. Our contribution here today comes after deep reflection of our 27 years of involvement in assisting to resolve conflicts in Africa and around the world.”

    2019-02-27 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8473 (2019) · source

13. “All good conflict management practitioners know that one cannot make headway in resolving a conflict without first getting the conflicting parties to have a shared understanding of the problems confronting them. In building a new partnership, we need to develop a shared consensus on the nature, causes and manifestations of the security threats that confront the world today. With such a shared understanding, common solutions will follow. In 1945, we united under this body to bring peace to the world. Today, 60 years later, we are divided about how to bring peace to the world. Let not future generations say that here stood a people who presided over a United Nations of divided nations. Let us forge a new partnership and build a new consensus.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source

14. “The need could not be more urgent for the centralized coordination of development efforts that bring all actors together to work out, with the Government of the host country and the local population, a post-conflict reconstruction agenda and a sustainable development agenda. However, the Commission will be stillborn unless it can mobilize the broadest set of relevant constituencies. To do that, it must make itself accessible to all relevant actors at the local, national, regional and international levels through all the forums of the United Nations. In the minute remaining, let me indicate that, apart from a new partnership, the world needs a shared consensus.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source

15. “In January 2005, we completed and submitted the post-conflict reconstruction framework document for the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) after we were commissioned by NEPAD to develop and manage a process for the development of such a document. These initiatives are practical examples of civil society and governmental and intergovernmental cooperation towards conflict prevention and the pacific settlement of disputes. I turn now to one of the most important developments to come out of the United Nations reform process: the Peacebuilding Commission. Its introduction and purpose could not have been timelier for a country like Burundi, which has just emerged from conflict but faces huge challenges, has very few resources, and is confronted with competing donor and non-governmental organization (NGO) priorities for assistance.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source

16. “In our own case, as the African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD), we have met and worked with warlords in Somalia when many States where not able to meet with them. We have trained and prepared rebel groups in Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo for negotiations, and they will testify to the role that we have played in empowering them to enter negotiations. We have also assisted the Facilitator for the Inter-Congolese Dialogue, former President Masire of Botswana, to prepare his mediation team and advised him on mediation process and strategy during the actual talks. As we speak, almost 30 United Nations officials from the Department of Peacekeeping Operations are being hosted by our institution in South Africa, for a course for senior mission-leaders.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source

17. “At the outset, let me indicate that we recognize and respect that the settlement of political disputes between States and within States is, and should remain, the domain of nation-States. Civil society should complement the role of nation-States and remain outside the formal structures of the United Nations, since its strength, legitimacy and flexibility derive from its independence. However, today conflicts are multifaceted and complex in nature, and they increasingly require a comprehensive strategy involving a multiplicity of actors, including civil society. There are many stages to a conflict and many dimensions to a conflict. Depending on the complexity of the conflict all those stages and dimensions require different actors with different strategies and skills.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source

18. “Civil society organizations are also the prime movers of some of the most innovative initiatives to deal with emerging global threats". (A/58/817, p. 3) It is in this context and with the understanding that the complex conflicts of today require the collective wisdom and effort of all sectors of society in the emergence of a new form of multilateralism based on the opening of the Charter of the United Nations - "We the peoples" - that we the peoples - States, civil society and the private sector - need to forge a new partnership. That partnership must reject distinctions based on wealth and power and on geographic size and population. It must be based on collective wisdom, with each partner driven by its own comparative advantage, expertise and opportunity.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source

19. “Mr. Gounden: Let me take this opportunity to thank the President, his Permanent Mission to the United Nations and his Government, as well as the other members of the Security Council for giving civil society this opportunity to present our views before this body. Your initiative, Mr. President, is a sober reminder of the changes taking place in international relations. In the report of the Panel of Eminent Persons on United Nations-Civil Society Relations, the Chairman of the Panel and former President of Brazil, Mr. Fernando Henrique Cardoso, indicated that, "The rise of civil society is indeed one of the landmark events of our times. Global governance is no longer the sole domain of Governments. The growing participation and influence of non-State actors is enhancing democracy and reshaping multilateralism.”

    2005-09-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5264 (2005) · source