Jose Garson, Former expert at United Nations Capital Development Fund, 20-year experience in development projects with Least Developed Countries, anti-poverty strategies
Full Remarks
The UN has been working for many years in zones where there were conflicts. We at the UN invented the famous scale going from relief to development. I participated myself in Central America, in Nicaragua, in El Salvador, in two programs funded by the UN and the government of Italy to reconstruct these countries. We literally reconstructed the country, starting from the courts, going to the schools, it was a complete reconstruction. The program was called PRODERE and the UN agency that worked very efficiently to implement the program was UNOPS, based today in Geneva.
Now, if you say that, on the one hand, UNRWA has participated in all the problems, and a lot of people should be brought to justice and everything, that’s one side. The second side should be to try to understand what would be the need to cater to all these people.
And I’m not talking about only the refugees. This is something very, very special that UNRWA has, they categorize a sort of segment of the Palestinian population, since they cannot really make the difference between them. So it’s officially the refugees, but it’s also the others and so on. This has to be taken off: The ‘R’ in UNRWA shouldn’t be ‘Relief’ - ‘Relief and Works’, which is an expression that dates from the 40s. Nobody uses this expression today.
So what I envision, and I’m not taking a stand about a Palestinian state, whatever the political solution is going to be. But you have a number of Palestinians, and you don’t have any administration in charge of: a) building the structures, b) getting them functioning, and this applies not only to Gaza but also to Jordan, to Syria, to Cisjordania, and so on. So there is a need, so to speak, for a development bank. I’m not going to use the word ‘bank,’ but there is a need for it.
And there is a need for a governance structure which reflects the powers today in the world. Not only the big powers from the Security Council, but the regional powers, including Israel. So the only way to get there, in my opinion, and following the habits of the UN administration, would be, number one, to get everyone around the table to put all the ideas on the table.
Of course, you have to have someone who takes the initiative, and I think UN Watch would be perfect to take this initiative.
So step one, gather everybody and try to see how this development agency could be set up, what would be the terms of reference, the beneficiaries and so on.
Number two, this meeting should create the terms of reference of a consulting team that would go in the field and come back with figures, different things that could structure the feasibility study of the new UNRWA. And then this can be presented at the UN in New York, either at the General Assembly and/or the Security Council.
The carrot in the whole thing is that if the institution is well designed, there will be much more money going to the Palestinians. If you look at the UNRWA site, they’re asking for donations. It’s like they are begging people to give money. And obviously they don’t have enough money for the job they have.
But if you have a structured institution that follows the rules that other institutions follow, then there will be a lot of contributions. There will be, not only the Arab states, but the European states, and everything. It’s a development agency. Everybody’s interested in development. And of course, there shouldn’t be one person at the head, but of course, a whole governance structure that ensures that checks and balances are present.
I think you have a very important role. UN Watch has a very important role to play, and I support what you are doing. Thank you.
