Executive Director Babatunde paid his first visit to the Arab States Regional Office at the end of June. During his two-day visit to Cairo, he held an open discussion with Regional and Country Office staff, and met with the Egyptian Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister and the Minister for Health and Population. In spite of his tight schedule, he also made sure to share his views about the future with Egyptian youth in a special session with Y-PEER members.
Inspiring and focused despite the long journey, the ED highlighted the importance of meeting with UNFPA staff to share his vision for the organization’s future and to listen and respond to questions about the main issues affecting the turbulent region.
The message was clear: 215 million women want to plan their pregnancies but do not have modern contraception or access to a full reproductive health package. UNFPA needs to focus and realign its activities towards this outcome and produce results. Both staff offices (ASRO and the Cairo Country Office) inquired about how best to integrate UNFPA’s traditional holistic approach into this vision. “Reproductive rights, access to information to enable informed choices and commitment to fulfill young people’s aspirations should not be left aside,”’ remarked several of the attendants.
In addressing internal issues, Babatunde answered questions about audit requirements and human resources policies among others, but most of the discussion focused on two issues: UNFPA’s communication strategy and the need for a quick and accurate system to broker technical assistance.
Noted one of staff member in attendance: "UNFPA has a great capability to engage with different and diverse partners and this triggers innovative ideas. These ideas are later developed in full by other agencies however, because in a changing and challenging environment we are not yet able to provide specific technical assistance in a timely manner".
The ED agreed with this assessment and reaffirmed his commitment to technical as well as communication challenges as key priority areas. He noted that UNFPA deals with issues that have a deep impact on people’s life but that learning how to speak clearly and publicly about them remains the challenge for the organization. “UNFPA deserves better branding in the field and in the international arena to spread the message of the ICPD agenda that is so relevant today,” he added.
The ED’s visit to Cairo also included a meeting with a group of young people from the Y-PEER network in Egypt where he emphasized that UNFPA believes in working with young people as partners in creating change. It was an informal gathering in which Babatunde responded to the young people’s questions about UNFPA’s vision and strategy and informed them about the outcomes of his meetings with different public figures in Egypt – and naturally, the visit would not have been complete without an exchange about recent events and the aftermath of revolution in the country.
