by Nurat Uthman
The 56-nation Commonwealth announced Ghana’s foreign minister Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey as the organisation’s new secretary general at a rancorous summit that concluded in Samoa on Saturday.
The voluntary association of sovereign states is mostly made up of former British colonies.
Botchwey was one of three candidates vying for the post, all who have backed calls for Britain to address the legacy of colonialism and slavery.
A former lawmaker, she has served as foreign minister for the past seven years, notably steering Ghana’s two-year tenure on the UN Security Council, ending December 2023.
She has backed the drafting of a free trade agreement among Commonwealth member states and has previously said she stands for reparations.
“Financial reparations is good,” she said at an event in London earlier this year.
A Commonwealth Secretary-General can serve a maximum of two terms of four years each. The incumbent is Dominican Baroness Patricia Scotland.
By convention, the secretary general role is rotated around the body’s four geographical blocs: the Pacific, Asia, Europe, and Africa. It was now Africa’s turn.
“Truly humbled by the overwhelming support of the Commonwealth Heads of Government in selecting me as the incoming Secretary-General of the Commonwealth” she posted on social media.
“The work indeed lies ahead!”
