The selection of the next UN secretary-general is struggling to reach a conclusion. Chosun Ilbo reported on 8 October that the Security Council has held five informal polls without producing a clear picture, prompting talk that a ‘new candidate’ may need to enter the race. With Antonio Guterres’s second five-year term ending on 31 December, there is a growing sense that time is running short.

The field and the process

When the first informal poll took place in late July, wire reports such as Reuters and the Dawn newspaper listed seven candidates: Michelle Bachelet of Chile, Maria Fernanda Espinosa of Ecuador, Rafael Grossi of Argentina (head of the International Atomic Energy Agency), Rebeca Grynspan of Costa Rica, Olara Otunnu of Uganda, Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett of Guyana and Macky Sall of Senegal. Grynspan, a former Costa Rican vice president, was reported to have taken an early lead, but ambassadors declined to disclose the results and no vote counts were made public.

The procedure is not simple. A candidate needs at least nine votes on the 15-member Council, and each of the five permanent members can wield a veto. Whoever clears the Council then goes to the General Assembly for formal appointment. The informal straw poll dates to the early 1980s, when it was devised to unlock a veto-bound deadlock, and it lets members signal whether they would encourage, discourage or have no opinion on each candidate.

A transparency dispute

The dispute has also spread to how open the process should be. According to Segye Ilbo, General Assembly President Annalena Baerbock wrote to member states on 4 September criticising the Council’s opacity and urging it to put forward more than one candidate so the Assembly could make a real choice. The United States and Russia reportedly pushed back, arguing that Council deliberations must stay confidential and warning that the president was overstepping her role.

Explanations for the delay differ. Deep divisions among the permanent members are one factor, and some observers suggest that no contender has clearly won the favour of US President Donald Trump. Members’ hopes for the first woman in the post and discussions about regional rotation add further variables. These are diplomatic readings, however, and should be kept separate from confirmed facts.

The key question is whether the Council can find someone acceptable to all by year’s end. There are precedents for lesser-noticed names emerging as late compromises, so the ‘new candidate’ scenario cannot be ruled out. If agreement slips further, though, the incoming secretary-general will have less time to prepare, which could strain the organisation’s work.