UWI lecturer Dr Hamid Ghany is among nominees from Guyana and Jamaica vying for the post of secretary general of the African, Caribbean and Pacific group (ACP) which will be finalised between today and Friday. The decision will be made by the ACP’s Council of Ministers meeting in Brussels currently taking place. The ACP Group involves 79 states. Apart from Ghany, the nominees include Jamaica’s Patricia Francis and Guyana’s Dr Patrick Gomes.
The appointed person will hold executive powers as head of the Brussels-based ACP secretariat in the administrative and technical body of the ACP group. The group is the largest inter-governmental organisation of developing countries, working under a partnership treaty with the European Union, through which EUR 31.5 billion has been committed for development co-operation in 78 countries in Africa, the Caribbean and Pacific for 2014-2020.
At an ACP meeting in Suriname recently the council agreed the next secretary general for the March 2015-March 2020 period would come from the Caribbean. Communication Minister Vasant Bharath said yesterday: “T&T’s chance in the situation is very high, due to the level of qualification and experience of our candidate. We are monitoring the outcome.”
Ghany is a senior lecturer in the area of government and a former Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of the West Indies (UWI) in Trinidad. He is also director of the non-profit organisation Principles of Fairness (since 2005), a position he has held for nearly ten years.
An expert in governance, legal and parliamentary issues, Ghany recently served as a commissioner of the Constitution Commission as well as the Equal Opportunity Commission of T&T and led a number of public consultations and national committees on constitutional reform since the 1990s until the present. He was a director of the T&T Chamber of Industry for over seven years, during which he chaired several committees, including the Crime Committee and Committee on Delays in Judicial Hearings.
A prominent Caribbean academic, Ghany is widely published, in particular on regional politics and social issues, in addition to being a regular media commentator and columnist on public affairs. He has developed a range of important innovative academic programmes at UWI and expanded the university’s international linkages.
In 2012, he was awarded the Chaconia Medal (Gold)—the second highest award of the National Awards of T&T—for “long and meritorious service” as an educator in the field of education.
Other nominees
Francis is the former executive director of the Geneva-based International Trade Centre (ITC). She led the multi-lateral organisation from 2006 to 2013, managing major transition processes and expanding project implementation. Among key roles in the private sector, she served as president of the World Association of Investment Promotion Agencies for four years and was president of Jamaica Promotion Corporation (JAMPRO) from more than a decade.
She currently chairs Jamaica’s Public Sector Transformation and Modernisation Committee, while also serving on advisory boards of academic institutions, such as SciencesPo in Paris and the IESE Business School in Barcelona, as well as board of the Jamaica Producers Group.
Gomes is Guyana’s ambassador to the European Union and the Kingdom of Belgium and accredited to six other European nations and the country’s representative to the WTO, FAO and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).
Gomes has led various high-level ambassadorial committees in the ACP system, currently serving as chair of the Working Group on Future Perspectives of the ACP Group, which will submit its final report on “transforming the ACP Group into a global player” to the ACP Council this week. He is also the dean of ACP ambassadors in Brussels and chair of the sub-committee on sugar.
He previously served as chair of the Committee of Ambassadors, a decision-making body of the ACP Group, in 2010-2011.