Opening the month of September at the Security Council, the French presidency recalled before the press what the office of Secretary-General entails: peace and security, the impulse given to development and human rights, and the running of an administration with constrained finances. President Macky Sall's candidacy answers each of these three parts.
Peace and security, first. The Secretary-General's first duty is to prevent wars and to help bring them to a close. He raises the alarm before the irreparable, offers his good offices, and draws on the regional organisations the Charter associates with the maintenance of peace. A candidacy from a continent where peace is built each day knows the price of prevention, and knows it always costs less than intervention.
An impulse to development and rights. The Secretary-General does not vote budgets and does not sign treaties, but he carries weight. He puts on the agenda the debt that smothers, the financing that is missing, the climate that displaces, and he recalls rights when they recede. That impulse the candidacy has already given, debt and development finance foremost.
Running an administration with counted means. The Organization is passing through a liquidity crisis: unpaid contributions, tightened budgets, a reform under way to adjust its means without giving up its mission. To lead the Secretariat is to hold a global administration without adding to its weight, to choose priorities and to account for them. Twelve years at the head of a state demand this every day.
Experience in multilateral negotiation. Twelve years as head of state and the chairmanship of the African Union in 2022 underpin these commitments, from the G20 to the world's summits. That experience explains why the vision statement filed with the United Nations frames its proposals as obligations: peace, security and development conceived together; a renewed multilateralism; stronger governance of the Organization.
Africa at its heart, the world in its sights.
The French Security Council presidency's press conference of 1 September 2026 is public. Read all public positions at www.mackysall.net