Amina Mohamed of Kenya with US Support Emerges an early WTO DG Front-Runner

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Champagne receptions at lakeside villas. Rosé luncheons at the Intercontinental Hotel. Even during a pandemic, the feting of Geneva’s trade diplomats continues apace.

Last week the eight candidates to lead the World Trade Organization wined and dined delegates and made their case for why they’re the best person to right a sinking ship.

One by one the candidates explained their vision for fixing the WTO’s moribund negotiating function, its paralyzed dispute settlement system and the various other ailments that have sidelined the world’s foremost arbiter of trade.

At the close of the week there was a general perception that Kenya’s nominee, Amina Mohamed, is the early front-runner.

She checks many of the boxes that delegates say they are looking for in the next WTO director-general, a job never held by a woman. She’s a former WTO ambassador, an ex-trade minister and a previous chair of a WTO ministerial conference. And, most important, has US support so visible in the Nairobi Ministerial Meet 2015.

She’s fluent in the WTO’s procedures and legal texts and she personally helped negotiate the WTO’s most recent package of multilateral agreements. She also hails from sub-Saharan Africa’s third-largest economy, from a continent that’s pursuing more free trade with the world.

Though each candidate will continue their campaigns until Sept. 7, some are destined for elimination. Saudi Arabia and Moldova’s candidates are in that category, according to some delegates.

It remains unclear how many candidates will be bumped off in the first cut — some say three, some say four. At this point the viability of any candidate largely depends on their ability to avoid the dreaded veto.

The WTO operates on the basis of consensus and the final candidate should, in all likelihood, have the support of the WTO’s 164 members. That’s no easy feat because nations can withhold their support for any reason — like, say, a bitter economic fight between Japan and South Korea that dates back to World War II.

Entertaining trade diplomats at fancy Geneva restaurants like the legendary Perle du Lac certainly won’t hurt a candidate’s chances — but it won’t do a thing to resolve epic geopolitical fights like Qatar’s feud with Saudi Arabia and Egypt or Europe’s lingering resentment over Brexit.