UN-HABITAT’s Executive Director, Mrs. Anna Tibaijuka, has mandated the Sierra Leone ambassador to Ethiopia, Mr. Melvin H. Chalobah, to be UN-HABITAT’s focal point to the African Union (AU) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Mrs. Tibaijuka made the offer when Ambassador Chalobah presented his credentials to her as his country’s Permanent Representative to UN-HABITAT. With this development, Ambassador Chalobah will coordinate UN-HABITAT’s activities with African Ambassadors at the AU. Congratulating Ambassador Chalobah on his appointment as his country’s Permanent Representative to UN-HABITAT, Mrs. Tibaijuka stated that she was confident he would live up to expectations in his new position, both as a former United Nations staff member and as a former staff of the African Development Bank (ADB). She said the UN-HABITAT was trying to establish a linkage with the ADB for the bank to fund projects in Africa, as it did the Asian Development Bank, which has established a US$500 million fund for UN-HABITAT’s Water For Asian Cities Programme. The Executive Director said UN-HABITAT would like to work in Sierra Leone and called on Ambassador Chalobah to ensure that habitat issues were adequately represented in the Sierra Leone Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP). Accepting the offer to be UN-HABITAT’s focal point, Ambassador Chalobah said he looked forward to working with UN-HABITAT to ensure the continued success of the organization’s programmes. He said that the housing situation in Sierra Leone was made worse by the country’s decade of civil war and called for UN-HABITAT assistance to solve the problem. Ambassador Chalobah has concurrent accreditation to 10 East and Southern African countries, Israel, the AU and the Economic Commission for African (ECA). |
