President Macky Sall's candidacy for the office of UN Secretary-General places the governance of migration among its priorities. Most people who leave their country do so to work or study, and mobility, when poorly governed, feeds deaths at sea and the trafficking of human beings.
A global fact, often poorly described. The world counts about 281 million international migrants, a little over 3 % of humanity, according to the United Nations. Most live and work regularly in their host country; the image of an uncontrolled influx conceals a reality made mostly of work and families.
Safe, orderly and regular. In 2018, states adopted in Marrakesh a global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration. It takes from no state the control of its borders; it organises cooperation among the countries that disorder leaves alone before the same tragedies.
Legal routes against trafficking. Where safe routes are missing, smugglers prosper and lives are lost. Opening legal migration pathways and fighting trafficking protect people better than walls raised after the fact.
What the Secretariat can carry. The Secretary-General does not set states' migration policies. He can support the global compact and bring countries together around cooperation, recalling that mobility governed together serves each one better than a border left on its own.
Experience in multilateral negotiation. Twelve years as head of state and the chairmanship of the African Union in 2022 underpin these commitments. 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 global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration, adopted in Marrakesh in 2018, is public. Read all public positions at www.mackysall.net