Do You Know: First West African To Be Elected As The President Of UNESCO General Conference: Michael Omolewa

Jeremiah Aluwong

3 years ago

Michael Abiola Omolewa is a Nigerian diplomat, scholar, education historian, and civil servant. Omolewa is an emeritus professor of adult education at the University of Ibadan. He is a former deputy chair of the governing board of the Commonwealth of Learning in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Omolewa is also a member of the Commonwealth Advisory Council on Teacher Mobility, Recruitment and Migrations in London.

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On 29 September 2003, Omolewa, as Ambassador and Permanent Delegate of Nigeria to UNESCO became the first West African to be elected President of the General Conference (GC) of UNESCO for the following two years. The GC of UNESCO is the highest decision-making and governing body of that United Nations specialized agency.

About the General Conference of UNESCO

The General Conference consists of representatives of the 195 States Members of UNESCO and 8 Associates. The GC meets every 2 years, and is attended by the Member States and Associate Members, together with observers for non-Member States, intergovernmental organisations and NGOs: non-governmental organisations. Each country has one vote, irrespective of its size or the extent of its contribution to the budget of UNESCO.

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The General Conference of UNESCO determines the policies and the main areas of work of the Organization. Its duty is to establish programmes and budgets for UNESCO. It also elects members of the Executive Board of UNESCO and appoints, every four years, the Director-General of UNESCO. The working languages of UNESCO’s General Conference are: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.

Giant Strides at UNESCO

From September 2003 to October 2005, he served as the 32nd president of the General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). While president, Omolewa led UNESCO to adopt the International Declaration on Human Genetic Data and the Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage. From January 2000 to August 2009, Omolewa served as permanent delegate and ambassador of Nigeria to UNESCO. At the University of Lagos, on Wednesday 6 February 2019, Omolewa delivered the 5th Enoch Adeboye Annual Birthday Public Lecture; titled: Peace: The Global Quest.

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In September 2008, Omolewa was given the President’s award for distinguished contribution to world peace and solidarity by Bulgaria’s President Georgi Sedefchov Parvanov. Also in 2008, Omolewa was inducted into the University of Oklahoma’s International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame. He is a board member of ILI: International Literacy Institute – within Graduate School of Education, established by UNESCO and the University of Pennsylvania: the United States of America in 1994; plus a Member, Board of Governors: Christ the Redeemer’s College, Sagamu; as well as Deputy chairman of the board of Governors: Christ the Redeemer’s College, United Kingdom; including being Board of Trustees Member at Babcock University. Omolewa is also on the Editorial Boards of New York-based International Journal of Higher Education and Washington D.C.-based ASALH: Association for the Study of African American Life and History’s Journal of African American History; including Journal of Research in International Education and International Journal of Lifelong Education. Source Unesco.org Wikipedia.org. Featured Image Source: Tribune Online

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