Okonjo-Iweala and Yoo advanced to the final stage, the WTO announced in early October 2020.

Who is Nigeria’s Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala?

Former Nigerian finance minister Okonjo-Iweala pitched herself as an “unusual director general” prepared to break the status quo at the WTO.

During her candidacy, she focused on her track record of diplomacy, development and reform, which has seen her spend 25 years at the World Bank, join the board of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and take corporate board membership at Twitter and Standard Chartered Bank, along with positions at a dizzying roster of non-profit organisations.

Ngozi also holds an American passport, having taken dual citizenship in 2019, following decades of working at the World Bank and studying in the United States.

Who is South Korea’s Yoo Myung-hee?

Yoo was one of the most highly regarded of the eight initial candidates to lead the global trade body, having spent 25 years working in various trade roles for the South Korean government, culminating in her appointment as Seoul’s first female trade minister in 2019.

As South Korea’s chief trade strategist, she was involved in negotiating the China-South Korea Free Trade Agreement, signed in 2014, and renegotiating the United States-Korea Free Trade Agreement, signed in 2018.

She also spent time at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Secretariat and the South Korean embassy in China.

During her candidacy, Yoo said that the dysfunction at the WTO might be partly to blame for the trade spat between China and the US, which has run for more than two years, and has helped usher in a period of wider rivalry between the world’s two largest economies.

“Perhaps their trade tensions are, to some extent, due to the lack of a progress at the WTO, which for the last 25 years has not produced any multilateral trading agreements except for the trade-facilitation agreement,” Yoo said, referring to the chronic failure of the Geneva institution to create a modern open trading system capable of dealing with contrasting economic systems.

“If the WTO fails again to reinvent itself, maybe more members might be compelled to deal with their disputes in their own way outside the WTO, either bilaterally or unilaterally,” Yoo said, adding that her long experience in negotiating with both parties qualifies her to act as a mediator, should she win the race to become the WTO’s next director general.

How have we reached this point?

However, the US told an informal gathering of the heads of delegations that it will not back her candidacy, meaning Okonjo-Iweala does not yet have the consensus needed to secure the job.

WTO General Council chair David Walker told the same meeting that Okonjo-Iweala is most likely to achieve consensus, having gained the backing of a sizeable majority of WTO members.

“One delegation could not support the candidacy of Dr Ngozi and said they would continue to support the South Korean minister [Yoo Myung-hee] – that delegation was the USA,” said WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell.

What is the next step to appoint a new director general of the WTO?

The final decision was expected to be made at a formal meeting of the General Council on November 9, after the US election. But three days before the meeting was due to take place, the WTO announced “the meeting would be postponed until further notice, during which time he would continue undertaking consultations with delegations”.

If a consensus cannot be reached, then the WTO race will go for the first time to a members’ vote.

The WTO was not officially informed about Yoo’s decision to exit the race immediately, but the expectation is that there will be no movement on the appointment of a director general until the next US trade chief is installed, which could be before the end of February. The next meeting of the WTO’s general council is on March 1 and 2.

The WTO Appellate Body is meant to comprise seven judges appointed by the Dispute Settlement Body to serve for four years. And at least three judges are needed to rule on a case.

Zhao Hong, the last member of the appeals panel at the WTO’s dispute-settlement mechanism, gave her farewell speech in Geneva at the end of November 2020.

What are the challenges facing the new WTO director general?

Either Okonjo-Iweala or Yoo would be the first woman to lead the WTO when they follow in the footsteps of Ireland’s Peter Sutherland, Italy’s Renato Ruggiero, New Zealand’s Mike Moore, Thailand’s Supachai Panitchpakdi, France’s Pascal Lamy, and most recently, Brazil’s Azevedo. Okonjo-Iweala would also be the first African leader of the WTO.

But whoever is victorious will be faced with a significant raft of challenges, including sorting out the WTO’s dispute-settlement function, considered by many to be its most important pillar.

With the WTO’s Appellate Body having no serving judges for the first time ever, its ability to handle disputes has been completely eroded.

They will also inherit an organisation that has been completely marginalised by bilateral disputes.

On the US-China trade war, Okonjo-Iweala said during her candidacy that the WTO could help “rebuild trust” by focusing on the issues that both sides are already at the negotiating table on. This included ongoing negotiations on fisheries subsidies – success in which would show that “the WTO can actually get all members to deliver something positive”, before focusing on meatier issues.

Okonjo-Iweala said she was “horrified” in recent years to hear the WTO roundly dismissed as “dysfunctional” and “paralysed”, saying that in her days at the World Bank the trade body was regarded with the “utmost respect as a top multilateral agency”.

“What are the words you hear about the WTO? Now, ‘this function is paralysed’, or ‘it doesn‘t do anything relevant’. One radio host asked me: ‘Why are you even applying for this job at an organisation which is irrelevant?’ And I was really taken aback,” she said.

Yoo also said that tariff battles like the US-China trade war could become more widespread, should global trade’s governing body “fail again to reinvent itself”.

“I don’t know why I am considered as close to the US because during my lifetime, I have worked closely with both countries,” Yoo said, when asked if the politics of the situation could be disqualifying. “In spite of all the geopolitical issues, at the end of the day, I’m confident that members can select someone who can actually deliver on the reform.”

The next director general will also be charged with overseeing reform of the Geneva body. The US, EU and Japan have pushed for reform on rules about state industrial subsidies, thought to be aimed at China.

Many developing countries, meanwhile, liken the EU’s common agricultural policy to a market-distorting agricultural subsidy. The winning candidate will need to perform a balancing act if they are to lead the WTO to reform that meets everyone’s needs.

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