In this January 2017 photo, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, a former health minister and foreign minister of Ethiopia, speaks to media. He was elected to head the World Health Organisation on Tuesday. (Martial Trezzini/Keystone/Associated Press)
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, a former health minister and foreign minister of Ethiopia, won an election on Tuesday to head the World Health Organization (WHO), the first African to do so, edging out a veteran insider from Britain.
A jubiliant Ethiopian official emerged from the closed-door meeting in Geneva, to shout after the secret ballot where
Britain’s candidate David Nabarro came second: “We did it, we did it!”
“It’s a victory day for Ethiopia and for Africa,” Ethiopia’s ambassador Negash Kebret Botora told Reuters.
Known universally as Tedros, he garnered 133 votes from the 185 WHO member states who officials said were eligible to cast ballots in the vote to succeed Margaret Chan, who has been at the helm of the Geneva-based U.N. agency since Nov. 2006.
The other candidate was Sania Nishtar, a 54-year-old cardiologist and former government minister from Pakistan.
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The winner succeeds Chan, who’s ending a 10-year tenure.
The U.N. agency’s chief has considerable power to set global medical priorities and declare health emergencies, such as outbreaks of the Zika or Ebola viruses.
The new five-year term begins on July 1.