The Summit of the Future will be held in a matter of two days on 22 and 23 September. Billed by the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres as a ‘once in a lifetime opportunity for reinvigorating multilateralism’, the Summit will bring together world leaders to the UN Headquarters in New York to deliberate and agree on measures for the reform of the multilateral system.

Diplomats of UN member states are busy with final negotiations, co-facilitated by Namibia and Germany, on the Pact of the Future that outlines the set of multilateral reform measures to be adopted by consensus by the 193 member states of the UN.

Despite the understandable question that the current state of diplomacy in the UN invites about whether this is a propitious moment for the summit, Guterres’s challenge to the international community and the negotiations over the Pact have prompted active policy discourse involving both state and non-state stakeholders. In Africa, the joint Namibia-Amani Africa High-Level Panel of Experts emerged as a unique platform for harnessing the expertise and knowledge of the diverse group of African experts for articulating a vision of reform of the multilateral system that Africa envisions and the world needs and deserves in the context of the Summit and beyond.

The report of the Panel largely shares the assessment of the Guterres about the state of the multilateral system. The analysis of the factors that make reform of multilateralism an existential imperative for people and planate affirm is detailed under a chapter titled ‘reform or rapture,’ echoing the stark statement of Guterres from September 2023 that ‘…global governance is stuck in time…it is reform or rapture.’

The report observed that the multilateral system is not only structurally flawed and operationally biased (as illustrated by the non-representation and/or under-representation of Africa in key multilateral decision-making structures) but it also has become outdated and unfit for dealing with the changes and emerging challenges facing the world. It thus underscores the need both for addressing the structural and operational flaws of the multilateral system and making it fit for the purpose of responding to the realities of the multipolar world. Deeming such reform to be a matter of existential imperative and strategic necessity, it outlines the proposed reform measures that also seek to ‘future-proof’ the multilateral system from the emerging large-scale and intersecting challenges.

One of the unique features of the Africa high-level Panel’s report is its insistence that the process of the reform of the multilateral system has to be anchored on what it calls ‘irreducible principles’. Underscoring the importance attached to these principles (drawn from the UN Charter and international law), the report dedicated a chapter in which the elements of these principles are clarified. One gap in the Summit that this highlights is the absence of an explicit statement of the principles guiding the elaboration of the Pact of the Future.

With respect to peace and security, the issues to which the Report addressed itself include a) the historic injustice of the non-representation of Africa in the permanent category and its underrepresentation in the elected category of the UNSC membership, b) the bias and double standards characterising the operation of the global collective security system and c) its colossal failure to respond meaningfully to some of the major conflicts in, most notably, Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine, among others. The Panel thus elaborated on ‘how the legitimacy and effectiveness of the UN, particularly its Security Council, can be restored by addressing this historic injustice on the basis of the Ezulwini Consensus as part of the Pact of the Future by affirming the commitment to treating Africa’s quest for permanent membership as a special case.’

The Panel’s position for Africa’s representation in the UNSC is not confined to the argument of rectifying the historic injustice the continent suffered and the attendant crisis of legitimacy afflicting the global body. What is novel is the Panel’s argument is the additional value proposition of Africa’s membership for the effectiveness of the Council.

Beyond meeting the demands of the principle of legitimacy, enlargement of the size of the Council, through the allocation of permanent and non-permanent seats within the Ezulwini framework, has also the role of injecting into the Council members who have [greater] stake in the effective functioning of the Council and hence have the incentive to operate as a moderating force for breaking the gridlock that from time to time paralyses the Council owing to geopolitical contestations between rival major powers in the UNSC.

This is premised on the recognition that the dysfunction and failure of the UNSC, like other parts of the multilateral system, tends to be most acutely felt in Africa and other parts of the world similarly situated. African states, and those similarly positioned in a reformed UNSC, thus possess, on account of their position, inherent motivation to operate as purveyors of common ground in a polarised and multipolar global order.

It is a major win for Africa that the Pact, in its latest version (4), states, as the first element of the first action point in the part concerning UNSC reform, the commitment of UN member states to ‘redress the historic injustice against Africa as a priority.’ Yet, as the recent announcement by the Permanent Representative of the US to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, expressing US support for two permanent seats for Africa made it clear, this commitment in the Pact could not be considered as reflecting support for Africa’s demand for two permanent seats with all their benefits and privileges, including the veto, if the veto is to be maintained.

With respect to the global financial and economic architecture, two of the five key reform areas that the Panel’s report proposed stand out. The first of this concerns the governance and decision-making structures and processes of the financial and economic institutions, including through the reform of the quota system of the IMF for ensuring effective representation of Africa in the Fund’s decision-making architecture and changing the business model of the international financial institutions.’ As the Panel observed ‘[r]eforming the quota system (in favor of developing countries while avoiding diminishment of existing quota shares) is crucial not only for its impact on voting rights but also due to its influence in guiding access to finance.’

The other relates to addressing challenges relating to access to development finance and the debt distress facing countries. In this respect, the Panel envisioned actions involving ‘independent global sovereign debt authority, rechanneling of SDRs through regional banks, reducing the cost of (access to development) financing and debt servicing and reforming credit rating standards and institutions.’

This has proved to be the aspect of the summit in respect of which major powers particularly the ‘US and its allies’ are reportedly reluctant to make any significant concession, arguing that ‘the UN is not the right space to negotiate financial issues.’ Viewed through the report of the Panel, this may be one of the areas where the Summit is not expected to advance substantial reform measures commensurate with what is required to meet the development needs of countries in Africa and other parts of the developing world. Yet, even here the elements in the latest (fourth) version of the Pact affirm the need for reform of the international financial architecture with a commitment for ‘more urgent and ambitious action to ensure that the international financial architecture becomes…fit for the world of today and responsive to the challenges faced by developing countries… Also worthy of note is the recognition of ‘the importance of continuing to pursue governance reforms at the international financial institutions and multilateral developments banks…to enhance the representation and voice of developing countries in decision-making, norm-setting, and global economic governance at the international economic and financial institutions, including the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.’

It is thus clear that viewed through the lens of the report of the independent Africa high-level panel, the Summit and its Pact are sure to fail if they were expected to be the platform where decisions on concretely reforming the governance institutions of the multilateral system will be made.

In the best-case scenario, it would be seen as a success if the Summit produces commitments identifying specific areas for and setting clear and concrete parameters for reform. Such commitments establish the basis for further negotiation covering not only the areas discussed above but also the reform areas identified in the Panel’s report relating to artificial intelligence, climate and future generations. This may not meet the kind of changes that the challenges facing the world and acutely felt in Africa require immediately. Yet as anticipated in the sub-heading of the Panel’s report ‘The Summit of the Future and Beyond’, the Summit will not be a failure if it commits member states to such clear and concrete parameters for negotiating the reforms concretely beyond the summit.