The "Great Man" of Peace

Kofi Annan was, in this sense, a great man. He led the most important organization in global cooperative history at arguably one of the most intransigent periods of contemporary history. One cannot speak about him without speaking about the United Nations, where he held a job that transformed into a calling, and eventually earned him the sobriquet of “the epitome of international diplomacy.” For many from Ghana, where he was born in 1938, and the African continent, he was much more than the silver-maned protector of peace, decency and good sense: the mere mention of his name was a source of comfort and motivation.

In 1997, Kofi Annan became the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations, and would serve in that capacity until 2006. Having joined the UN in 1962, he was the first to emerge from the organization’s multiplicitous bureaucracy. In 2001, he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with the organization he represented for, “their work for a better organized and more peaceful world.” Under Kofi Annan’s direction, the United Nations launched “a comprehensive programme of reform aimed at revitalizing” its processes. The overarching themes guiding his leadership were fiscal consolidation, advocacy for human rights, respect for international law, stronger ties with the corporate and civil sector, a push for a more inclusive and progressive society—The Millennium Development Goals (MDG’S)—and maintaining the impartiality and moral superiority of the United Nations. The final point is summed up in an account Annan gave in an interview with The Financial Times in 2011.