Battle for WTO leadership promises to be exciting

The battle to head the Geneva-based World Trade Organization may yet turn out to be an exciting affair. With the organization's current director general, Thailand's Supachai Panitchpakdi set to step down at the end of August, WTO signatories have been scrambling to come up with candidates to head the 148 member world trade watchdog before the end-December deadline for entering the race.

For once, the 25-nation EU has been able to overcome its chronic internal differences and agree unanimously that it will be endorsing Pascal Lamy, the former EU trade commissioner, as its candidate for the job.

The message from Brussels is that the United States and Asians should also throw their weight behind the EU choice. Not because the 57-year old Lamy is Europe's favourite but because bringing the current Doha round of global trade talks to a successful end requires a strong and forceful leader.

The French-born former banker, say EU insiders, has the political clout, professionalism and a dedication to multilateralism needed to run a body like the WTO. Lamy, who completed his five-year term as the EU's trade chief last month, faces an admirable list of opponents in the race for the top WTO job.

Uruguay has already put forward its former WTO ambassador, Carlos Perez del Castillo, while Brazil's ambassador to the WTO, Luiz Felipe de Seixas Correa, has also declared his interest.

Meanwhile, African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries have their own candidate, Jaya Krishna Cuttaree, the Mauritian foreign minister, while Kenya has also said it might nominate its trade minister, Mukhisa Kituyi.

The widening list of candidates does not augur well for the WTO which faced deep divisions and turmoil in 1999 when its members were divided over whether to nominate Supachai or New Zealand's Mike Moore for the top job.

In fact, EU countries were also split over the two candidates, with some voting in favour of Supachai but others backing Moore. In the end, the impasse was broken through agreement that the two men would take turns at the job for a period of three years each.

Another fractious fight to head the WTO would be an unwelcome distraction at a time when governments have to move rapidly in the Doha round. With a WTO ministerial meeting set to take place in Hong Kong at the end of 2005, diplomats in Geneva say governments will have to start making concessions in key areas such as agriculture and services by spring next year.

If not, the Doha round - initially expected to take no longer than three years but already running into its fourth year - will lose momentum and credibility. Lamy may, in fact, be just what the doctor ordered for the WTO. A French socialist, Lamy pleasantly surprised critics five years ago by morphing into a free-trade crusader once in Brussels.

Over the last few years, EU watchers have watched with admiration as he has tackled the French government over the need for EU farm reform and forced the bloc's reluctant and politically powerful farmers to accept changes in long-running EU subsidies and export credit systems.

French President Jacques Chirac may now have thrown his weight behind Lamy's bid to run the WTO but the French leader has also very publicly criticized Lamy for not doing enough to protect French interests in Europe and the WTO.

EU insiders say, however, that French ire at his policies is really to Lamy's credit. Significantly, the US administration has welcomed Lamy's candidacy while stopping just short of endorsing him.

A spokesman for Robert Zoellick, the US trade representative described the Frenchman as a "strong candidate". The spokesman said Zoellick had "great respect" for Lamy.

The two men are also personal friends and have managed to keep the transatlantic relationship on a more or less even keel despite an array of trade disputes, including the latest spat on aircraft subsidies.

A hard-working technocrat, Lamy built a reputation in Brussels as one of the EU's strongest and most powerful commissioners who is not afraid of speaking his mind. Along with Zoellick, Lamy played a key role in launching the Doha round of talks in November 2001 and in keeping negotiations afloat after the disastrous meetings in Seattle and Cancun last year. He was also instrumental in securing China's entry into the WTO.

Although initially caught wrong-footed by the growing power and influence of developing nations in global trade, Lamy said soon before leaving his EU job that he was now convinced that the days when the United States, the EU, Canada and Japan - members of the so-called "Quad" - could set the agenda in world trade negotiations were long gone. Lamy said he preferred the "new landscape" of world trade to the earlier mainly western-driven system.

To win WTO votes, Lamy will have to convince developing nations - especially in Asia - that he will be an impartial referee and a determined defender of the multilateral trading system.

His stint in Brussels is proof that while defending EU interests, Lamy is not impervious to the needs of developing nations. He will now probably need to repeat that message in even stronger terms.