Deva officially not in the race
The Fiji government has clarified the intent of a letter from its foreign minister to the President of the Security Council which the Deva campaign insisted was an official nomination.
In a word: No.
Fiji said on Friday it never intended to sponsor a British member of the European Parliament as a candidate for U.N. secretary-general, thereby eliminating him from the race, the council’s president said.
…
Vassilakis said Fiji had now refuted the letter from Foreign Minister Kaliopate Tavola, distributed to the 15 Security Council members on Wednesday.
Instead Fiji’s deputy U.N. ambassador, Filimone Kau, said in a note that “the letter presented to the council was not intended for the purpose of an official nomination by the Government of Fiji but was rather meant to support his candidacy,” Vassilakis said.
September 10th, 2006 at 10:59 am
[…] Sadly, though, the balls up over whether Fiji had officially nominated him does seem to imply that he’s not a particularly good at managing his public image, and neither is he particularly diplomatic. In fact, it looks like, in true British tradition, he’s a bit of a bungler. The confusion over whether British MEP Nirj Deva has received a formal nomination from the government of Fiji continues. His campaign maintains that the July 18th letter from Foreign Minister Kaliopate Tavola trumps the recent letter from Ambassador Isikia Savua, which stated that any report of a nomination by Fiji was “to be disregarded.” […]