President Uhuru Kenyatta on Monday welcomed the restructuring of the UN-Habitat and called on the established organs to re-engineer its processes to enable it deliver on its core mandate as the lead agency in urbanization and human settlements.
Kenyatta asked the established subsidiary organs, through the new governance structure, to strengthen the UN-Habitat’s organizational capacity and resource base to make it a centre of excellence and a global leader in the field of urbanization and human settlements development.
“This will also enable the UN-Habitat to effectively deliver on the double mandate entrusted to it as the designated focal point for sustainable urbanization and human settlements,” Kenyatta said.
Kenyatta was speaking at the UN-Habitat’s headquarters in Nairobi, where he officially opened the inaugural session of the UN-Habitat Assembly whose theme is ‘Innovation for a Better Quality of Life in Cities and Communities’.
The Assembly replaces the UN Governing Council following the endorsement of the resolution by the United Nations General Assembly in December 2018.
The resolution established a new governance structure which upgraded UN-Habitat’s status to a universal body and created a 36-member board.
“This new structure is really intended to transform UN-Habitat’s governance, provide oversight and enhance UN-Habitat’s efficiency and effectiveness in delivering its mandate,” Kenyatta said.
Kenyatta challenged the UN agency to formulate strategies that will transform cities and human settlements into engines of economic growth and development in a sustainable manner.
He urged all stakeholders to support the work of the UN-Habitat, noting that the implementation of the New Urban Agenda has been slow partly because of financial and institutional constraints at the global body as well as member states’ insufficient capacity to interpret, implement and report on the progress of the urban agenda.
“I also urge member states to increase and honour their voluntary contributions to the UN-Habitat human settlements foundation, while at the same time encouraging those in a position to do so, to consider increasing non-earmarked funds to be part of the core budget of UN-Habitat,” he said.
JK/abj/APA