Petition to UN Secretary-General Guterres: Stop disenfranchisement in the UN now! 31 May 2021

Please sign this petition to UN Secretary-General Guterres and ask family and friends to sign as well. UN Pension Fund is a public pension fund. Anyone can sign! Click link to petition for French and Spanish versions.

https://secure.avaaz.org/community_petitions/en/un_secretarygeneral_guterres_stop_disenfranchisement_in_un_pension_board_elections/

Members of the Pension Fund and Board leadership have tried for years to muzzle UN participant representatives on the Board, going so far as to try to change Pension Fund rules. Now they want to stop them from running for elections. They must not succeed!

"The United Nations has promoted democracy around the world for 75 years.  And yet its subsidiary - the United Nations Pension Board, and certain UN senior officials , want the General Assembly (GA) to amend Article 6 of the UNJSPF regulations,  to disenfranchise hundreds of its active participants , by excluding them from sitting on the Board and overseeing their own pension fund. 

The UNJSPF is a public pension fund, designed by the GA for the social security of international civil servants. s ubsidized by taxpayers through their countries’ contributions to the UN and Specialized Agencies. 

The GA has not legislated to exclude this minority group of staff as this would violate the UN Charter.   Furthermore the right of UN Pension Fund staff to serve on the Board has been upheld three times by the UN Appeals Tribunal (UNAT) 

Yet certain senior UN officials are intent on interfering in the upcoming election which has always been run independently by the UN Staff Unions. 

Therefore signatories demand that: 

• Polling Officers end the delay and approve candidates who are staff of the Pension Fund, in accordance with Article 6 of the UNJSPF regulations. Stop consulting with management. Only the GA approved regulation matters! The delay amounts to an attack on justice and democracy and on the rights of your colleagues and all international civil servants.

• UN staff should have representatives who are experts to oversee their $85 billion dollar pension fund. Staff of the Pension Administration, Office of Investments Management (OIM) and of other specialized agency pension secretariats who have the most expertise must not be excluded from board membership.

• Participants of the UNJSPF  must elect whomever among their colleagues they wish to represent them on the UN Staff Pension Committee and Board. The Board may not create exclusionary rules which are contrary to the GA approved Article 6.

Stop disenfranchisement in the UN now! 


See UN Pension Blog for more information." 

UNOG Staff Coordinating Council to Polling Officers: No legal doubt about the eligibility of Penson Fund staff to run for elections, 26 May 2021

In the face of attempts to rig the elections, the President of the UNOG Staff Coordinating Committee writes to the Chair of the polling officers conducting upcoming elections of UN participant representatives to the Staff Pension Committee and Pension Board, noting that "there is no legal doubt as to the eligibility of Pension Fund staff to be candidates".

How the UN management is trying to prevent Pension Fund staff from running for election, 20 May 2021

The UN pension fund management and pension board have been trying for years to prevent fund staff from running for election to the staff pension committee and pension board.

Now with the ASG for Human Resources also Board Chair and the SG’s representative on the Board, they seem to think it's a "perfect storm" for achieving their goal.

There’s nothing principled about their attempts, which so far have been unsuccessful. 

They dislike the fact that two members of the UN participant representatives to the board, who are Fund staff, because of their insider knowledge of fund operations, have, along with other members of the group, been successful in blowing the whistle on mismanagement and irregularities in the Fund and triggering General Assembly reforms. https://www.passblue.com/2020/12/23/the-un-pension-funds-latest-flareups-and-hazards-to-whistleblowers/

Two of the Participants’ Representatives on the Board, who represent 85,000 staff in the UN common system,  who are also staff of the Fund, have won three cases at the UN Appeals Tribunal:

https://www.un.org/en/internaljustice/files/unat/judgments/2017-UNAT-801.pdf

https://www.un.org/en/internaljustice/files/unat/judgments/2017-UNAT-807.pdf

https://www.un.org/en/internaljustice/files/unat/judgments/2019-UNAT-908.pdf

 Each of these rulings was made after the Board in July 2017 proposed an unlawful amendment to its rules of procedure, and published it in the 2017 Board report dated 8 September 2017. https://undocs.org/A/72/383

The new rule (C1) states, in effect,  that staff of the Fund Secretariat and Staff Pension Committees are ineligible to be elected or appointed to represent constituents or serve on the Board.  

The then CEO of the fund, as respondent,  submitted the amendment  to the UNAT, which opined in paragraphs 27 and 31 of its rulings that “there was no law which precluded ….. elect[ion] to the UNSPC” when the appellants  decided to become candidates.

There is still no law that excludes pension fund staff and pension committee staff in agencies from running for election.

The rules of procedure of the Board are not the law.

Article 6 of the fund’s rules and regulations is the law, and it remains as intact as it was in 2017. 

It states, inter alia, that eligible candidates “shall be participants in the Fund and on the staff of the United Nations, elected by the participants in service in the United Nations by secret ballot.”

In fact, rule C.1 of the board’s rules of procedure is unlawful precisely because it does not conform to Article 6. 

In 2018, based on advice from the UN Office of Legal Affairs, the Board attempted to cover its tracks and proposed an amendment to Article 6 and even to remove the jurisdiction of the UNAT by amending Article 48.

The General Assembly in its resolution 73/274  in paragraph 20 did NOT approve the change to Article 6 (or 48) .  

In paragraph  21 the General Assembly recalled that it “has sole and ultimate authority to approve amendments to the Regulations governing the Fund“ and in response to a request to allow the Board to “adopt its own rules of procedure”   the General Assembly changed the Board’s proposal  and approved a change that read -  “subject to these regulations the Board could adopt it own rules….”  

This confirmed that any new rules of procedure must be compliant with the  laws (Articles) and cannot circumvent the GA approved Articles.

Rejected again and again

In resolution 74/263 2019 the General Assembly deferred the amendment of Article 6 (and  48) 

In resolution 75/246 2020 the General Assembly still did not  amend these articles, recognizing that the proposals would have a negative impact on the rights of participants and  even violate the UN Charter and remained unconvinced by the Boards proposals and justifications.

Aim to confuse

Even though  rule C.1 is unlawful, a point made clear by the GA decisions not to amend  Article 6, the new rule of procedure remains in the book for the sole purpose of confusing readers such  as polling officers and an arbitration committee that might have to make a decision concerning this challenge in the 2021 election of Participants’ Representatives.

Something nefarious at play

As the UNAT opined, this was not the first time that the matter had arisen, as the Pension Fund had challenged the candidacy of a staff member in 1989. The staff member ran for office but did not win in the election.   There was no attempt then to change the regulations or rules to exclude pension fund staff.

Again in 2012 a staff member in the Pension Fund’s Investments Division had run for election to the UNSPC.  There  was again no challenge to this candidacy, or any attempt to change the rules.

In 2017 when the two above-mentioned tpension fund staff decided to be candidates,  polling officers - recognizing that the regulations - Article 6 -  did not exclude any active participant from UNSPC membership rejected the challenge of the then Legal Officer of the Fund.

At that time both Fund staff candidates, one from Senegal, the other from Guyana, were successful.  The Board left no stone unturned in various attempt to disenfranchise them, including unlawfully excluding them from the 2017 meeting,  muting their microphones and  requesting them to recuse themselves from meetings where there was no conflict of interest. 

And still they persist.  

They must be stopped in their attempts to circumvent Article 6. The matter is one of  principle, transparency, oversight, equal treatment of all participants for the benefit of all  shareholders and  beneficiaries of the Fund.

 

UN Management faces accusations of rigging Pension Board elections, 18 May 2021

 

Elections take place in June for participant (staff) representatives to the UN Staff Pension Committee and Pension Board. Yet while the UN is supposed to set the standards when it comes to organizing elections around the world, these elections appear rigged from the start.

 

These elections are usually organized and financed by staff unions. This year the UN administration announced it would organize them without consulting staff unions. 

The Assistant Secretary-General (ASG) for Human Resources Management, who also happens to be the Chair of the board and a representative of the Secretary-General on the Board, established the polling officers and set the rules, creating a conflict of interest in what is supposed to be a tripartite system. 

It should be recalled that the ASG has a bone to pick with several of the incumbents and previously denounced them to the General Assembly. https://www.passblue.com/2020/12/23/the-un-pension-funds-latest-flareups-and-hazards-to-whistleblowers/

Yesterday the polling officers disseminated “rules on campaigning” (below). Unsurprisingly these appear to have been designed to exclude the same incumbents from participating, just as the ASG might have wanted. 

Two of the incumbents happen to be pension fund staff. 

Let’s recall that for years the fund management and Board tried to block those two staff from being on the Board, afraid of what they would reveal about the fund’s inner workings. These efforts were rightly rebuffed by the UN Appeals Tribunal (UNAT) and the General Assembly. 

So this time, instead of attempts to block them legally, the strategy seems to be for the polling officers to make it difficult for fund staff to run for election by not allowing them to use their computers, and presumably their email accounts, while other candidates face no such restriction. 

 

Also, campaigning during the election period is not allowed. That’s unheard of in any election since get-out-the-vote is an essential part of any campaign.

 

What does “offensive or defamatory content about any other candidate or group” mean? What “groups” are meant here? Who decides what is offensive or defamatory? If a candidate criticizes the operations of the fund, using the knowledge they have, will they be immediately disqualified, as the polling officers promise to do?

 

The polling officers appear to be taking it upon themselves to be arbitration committee and observers combined. Where’s the independent body to arbitrate these clear conflicts of interest?

 

The Secretary-General devotes a lot of time calling on developing countries to hold free, fair and inclusive elections. But with the UN itself holding rigged votes, does the UN retain any credibility on this front?

 

RULES ON CAMPAIGNING

     ·  Candidates may use social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, etc.) if they so wish during the campaign period. 

     ·  Candidates may hold a virtual debate on the platform of their choice. The Polling Officers will not participate in the preparation of such a debate, or in the debate itself, but reserve the right to observe it like any other staff member. 

     ·  Candidates will be immediately disqualified from the election for the following infractions: 

o Dissemination of defamatory or offensive content about any other candidate or group. 

o Abuse of authority for campaigning or self-promotion purposes, including but not limited to intimidation or coercion. 

o Use of Pension Fund facilities, computers, mailing lists or broadcasts for campaigning purposes. 

   ·  All campaigning activity must cease once the election period has begun. 

   ·  Any staff member who has reasonable cause or evidence indicating that a candidate is not observing the rules of the election is encouraged to notify the polling officers at the following address: UNSPCpollingofficers@un.org.

  ·  The Polling Officers, being independently responsible for organizing and conducting elections and publishing its results, retain the sole authority to decide whether an infraction of the above rules has occurred and whether a candidate will be disqualified. 

 

 

UN pension Fund global meeting 10 May 2021. On Youtube, 17 May 2021.

 UN pension Fund global meeting 10 May 2021. 

"As your representatives on the Pension Board and UN Staff Pension Committee we update and take questions from you on:

• Progress in cutting processing times and dealing with the backlog.

• Our work to safeguard the fund’s investments and make them greener.

• How we are making the fund more responsive to staff in the field.

• What we are doing to improve the fund’s governance.

• How we are working to safeguard and improve the benefits package."

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqD_CJVxkqk