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Swiss newspaper apologises for racist remarks against Okonjo-Iweala
BY KAZIE UKO
A Swiss German-language daily newspaper, Aargauer Zeitung, has apologised for using racist and sexist remarks in its reportage of the appointment of World Trade Organisation (WTO) new Director General, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.
Dr Okonjo-Iweala, a graduate of Harvard University and former Nigerian Minister of Finance, becomes the first African and first woman DG in the 26-year history of the WTO. She was elected by consensus by the 164-member countries, having emerged as the most qualified in a contest that featured eight distinguished candidates, made up of five men and three women.
The candidates for the WTO DG, top from left: Kenya’s former WTO General Council chair Amina Mohamed; Egyptian former diplomat Hamid Mamdouh; South Korean Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee; Former Saudi economy minister Mohammed al-Tuwaijri. Bottom, from left: Mexican former World Trade Organization (WTO) deputy director-general Jesus Seade; former Moldovan foreign minister Tudor Ulianovschi; Nigerian former foreign and finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala; and Britain’s first post-Brexit international trade secretary Liam Fox. /Fabrice Coffrini / AFP
“I’m thankful to all my sisters, UN Women Leaders and the 124 Ambassadors in Geneva who signed the petition on calling out the racist & sexist remarks in this newspaper. It is important & timely that they’ve apologized. @phumzileunwomen, @Winnie_Byanyima
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“We need to call out this behavior when it happens. This is precisely what my book Women & Leadership coauthored with @JuliaGillard talks about – the stereotypes women face when they take on leadership positions,” Okonjo-Iweala who formally assumes office Monday, March 1, 2021, declared on her Twitter handle early Monday morning.
In apology statement dated, 26 February 2021, the newspaper wrote: “In our print edition of Tuesday 9 February 2021 we ran an article on the new head of the World Trade Organization, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. The article also appeared in our online edition and in two other newspapers, Luzerner Zeitung und St. Galler Tagblatt, and their online editions.
“In our editorial office, we gave the article about the new head of the World Trade Organization the headline, “This grandmother will be the new chief of the World Trade Organization”. This headline was inappropriate and unsuitable. The title sparked angry reactions from readers. We apologise for this editorial mistake.”
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Senior African leaders at the UN, including Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, head of UN Women, Winnie Byanyima, who leads UNAids, and Vera Songwe, the executive secretary of the UN Economic Commission for Africa, had criticised the “sexist and racist” language used in coverage of the appointment of Okonjo-Iweala.
They said in a letter that the language used in some media to describe her appointment was “offensive, sexist and racist in a world where both public and private sector leadership is dominated by ageing Caucasian men, who are revered for the experience and skills they bring and have never been characterised by their lineage and offspring.”