NAIROBI, Kenya, Sep 24— President William Ruto has challenged the post-World War II global order, arguing that the institutions created in 1945 no longer reflect the geopolitical realities of the modern world and must be reformed to give Africa a permanent voice in decisions on war, peace and global economic governance.

📻 Breaking It Down

Addressing the 81st United Nations General Assembly in New York on Wednesday, Ruto placed Africa’s exclusion from the UN Security Council’s permanent membership at the centre of his broader critique of a multilateral system he said continues to proclaim sovereign equality while preserving structures of unequal power.

“Every nation in this hall has one vote. Every nation is sovereign and equal under the Charter. Yet on the gravest questions of war and peace, five nations possess a permanent power that the other 188 do not,” Ruto said.

“The equality proclaimed in this Assembly ends at the doors of the Security Council.”

📌 What You Need to Know

The Kenyan president argued that the imbalance may have reflected the international system that emerged from the Second World War but no longer corresponds to today’s world.

Ruto pointed specifically to Africa’s 54 UN member states, which account for more than a quarter of the General Assembly, but have no permanent seat on the Security Council.

“We are frequently the subject of its decisions, permanently discussed but permanently excluded,” he said.

The Security Council has five permanent members, including China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States, alongside 10 members elected by the General Assembly for two-year terms.

Reform of the Council has remained under intergovernmental negotiations for years, with the UN’s 2024 Pact for the Future explicitly identifying the redress of Africa’s historical underrepresentation as a priority.

Ruto’s intervention therefore went beyond a demand for additional seats, framing Security Council reform as a test of whether the multilateral system can adapt to a transformed distribution of political and economic power.

📰 Source: Capital FM Kenya