WHO Director-General's opening remarks at the Quarterly Briefing for Member States on Preventing and Responding to Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment - 7 December 2021

Honourable Ministers, Excellencies, dear colleagues and friends,

Good morning, good afternoon and good evening to all Member States.

As you know, from the time we were made aware of reports of sexual exploitation and abuse during the response to the 10^th Ebola outbreak in DRC, we have been committed to taking a new approach, by appointing an independent commission, and letting the commission hire an external firm to investigate.

Following the Commission's report we prepared a Management Response Plan to address individual and systemic issues, which was presented to you in October.

In July this year, I established an Organization-wide team with a full-time director reporting to me, so that I could personally be involved in the major changes that WHO needs to make to prevent and respond effectively to these critical issues.

This team has been tasked with addressing the recommendations of Executive Board resolution 148/4, and the Independent Commission.

Its job is also to ensure that our management response plan is fully implemented.

The Commission's report was clear that WHO needed profound reform of its structures, culture and practices.

Let me provide an update of the actions we have taken and the changes we have made so far.

First, of the 23 alleged perpetrators identified through the Independent Commission's report, 14 have now been uploaded to the UN ClearCheck database, to prevent rehiring of these individuals.

Two others have not been sufficiently identified, one has died, and the other six are cases of sexual harassment, which have not been uploaded to ClearCheck.

We are now regularly using ClearCheck to screen candidates.

Second, we are now working with partners in affected communities like Beni, in the current Ebola outbreak, to increase awareness of sexual exploitation and abuse. This includes scaling up support to victims and survivors of SEA from the 10th Ebola outbreak in DRC.

Third, we are strengthening WHO's capacity to address sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment in health emergency operations, and in programmes in high-risk communities.

To support this work, I have approved the hiring of 12 full-time dedicated staff in the highest priority countries in which we have complex health emergency operations, as well as in 2 countries that are priorities for the global polio eradication programme.

To strengthen managerial accountability, we will hire one senior full-time staff in each Regional Director's office.

At the global level, we are setting up a small team at headquarters, and working closely with the leaders of all accountability and programme functions.

I have approved funding of 30 million US dollars to implement the Management Response Plan over the next biennium. Additional resources will need to be mobilized for operations and programmes.

Fourth, we have now signed an agreement with the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services, OIOS, to complete the remaining investigations of incidents of alleged sexual exploitation and abuse identified in the commission's report.

Today we will sign a further agreement with OIOS to conduct an investigation into potential professional misconduct.

In addition, the Independent Expert Oversight Advisory Committee, IEOAC, will oversee the request for proposals for auditing all SEA cases, and a random selection of harassment cases has been posted, with a report due mid-May.

The IOEAC has also agreed to oversee the implementation of the Independent Commission's recommendations.

Fifth, we're developing a comprehensive policy framework on sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment, to update and harmonize previous policies, and provide end-to-end procedures and implementation guidance.

In the meantime, we have finalized an interim policy directive, which was sent to all staff yesterday.

Sixth, it is clear that we must reform and strengthen our accountability functions.

Even as a full audit of these functions is being undertaken, I have appointed a new Head of Investigations, Lisa McClennon.

Ms McClennon is an experienced investigator working in the Office of Internal Oversight Services, where she focuses on cases of sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment, and advises on how to strengthen systems, processes and capacity.

And seventh, we have stepped up our engagement with the UN and IASC, applying the IASC minimum operating standards to our organization and contributing to the joint and shared work on prevention and responding to SEAH.

One recent example of this is a joint IASC mission to the Democratic Republic of Congo and to Kenya, which Dr Gamhewage will brief you on.

As we move forward, we will shift to an effective victim and survivor-based approach; make sure that all our personnel and our implementing partners are knowledgeable about and accountable for PRSEAH; and reform our structures, culture and practices.

There is still a long way to go. This is not a check-box exercise.

We care deeply that we do everything in our power to prevent and respond to sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment.

I thank all Member States for your continued engagement in this issues, and I look forward to your comments, questions, and guidance.

I thank you.

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