Has the UN lived up to its Mission?

Has the UN lived up to its mission especially now that global leaders mostly from poor countries are congregating in New York, where they will make sweeping recommendations which sound good to an intelligent mind but are NEVER implemented? So far, has the UN achieved anything in maintaining global peace and security? How about health and environmental protection? How about checking human rights violations?

On peace and security, bombs are raining in Damascus Syria today, the Israel and Palestinian crisis has been in perpetuity at the Middle East, memories of the Rwandan genocide of 1994 left indelible memories to the entire human race, two Kenyan leaders are facing genocide charges at the ICC etc.

On health, West Africa is being wiped out by Ebola; leave alone the world’s struggle find a cure for the HIV pandemic for the last three decades since the incurable syndrome surfaced in the world.

On environmental protection, Kenya is the global headquarters of the United Nation Environment Program (UNEP) and Centre for Human Settlement; Habitat, but we still continue to experience environmental degradation- Karua Forest has been undergoing grabbing, the Mau conservation plan started about 7 years ago is still at limbo. Nairobi River is falling back to the old stench after the late Minister John Michuki did a wonderful job to clean it.

Don’t forget, our own President, Uhuru Kenyatta, who is currently in New York, authorized the destruction of a ship by exploding it in our Ocean. Did UNEP; housed in our State capitol Nairobi, question why Uhuru did what he did and even address the environmental implications of the sunken ship to aquatic and human lives?

Why can’t UNEP make Kenya a model for environmental protection, since we house them? It doesn’t make sense when you find an environmentalist from Paris living in Nairobi earning 5 million a month with allowances and doing totally nothing to protect the environment. We need results from the global body and not the glamour and the title which comes with it.

This is a huge intellectual debate with diplomatic connotations, power controls and memberships and funding. However, the common denominator remains, the UN hasn’t done enough since it was founded over six decades ago.