Sierra Leone’s President Urge More Seats For Africa

The country of Sierra Leone is pressing for a longstanding bid for African countries to get more council seats, including two permanent and potentially veto-wielding spots at the UN Security Council.

Addressing the council Monday, Sierra Leone’s president said that after decades of seeking a bigger voice in the United Nations ‘ most powerful body, Africa “cannot wait any longer.”

Calling his continent the “unquestionable victim” of an imbalanced, outdated and unrepresentative Security Council structure, he said the time for half-measures and incremental progress is over adding that Africa must be heard, and its demands for justice and equity must be met.

This will not be the first time the council has heard calls for expanding and reshaping its membership and African countries aren’t the only ones that want more representation.

While there’s a general sense that the council needs to change, discussions have bogged down over differences on how much to expand the group, what countries to include and what powers it should have.

But Bio’s presence put an exclamation point on the issue ahead of a U.N. “Summit of the Future” and the annual General Assembly gathering of presidents, prime ministers and monarchs. Both gatherings are scheduled next month.

Some countries are hoping for momentum from the summit, which is meant to generate a wide-ranging new vision of what international cooperation should look like in this century. The latest draft of the summit’s potential “Pact for the Future” terms Security Council reform a priority and pledges an “ambitious” result, with specific language still to come.

Set up in 1945 to try to maintain peace in the wake of World War II, the Security Council can levy sanctions, deploy peacekeeping missions and otherwise pass resolutions that are legally binding, if sometimes ignored.

The United States, Russia, China, Britain and France are permanent, veto-wielding members. Ten other seats — originally six, until a 1965 expansion — go to countries that get two-year council terms, without veto power. The broader General Assembly elects them by region, with three seats for Africa.