Fidelia Okafor.

Ms Amina Mohammed, the immediate past Minister of Environment, will be sworn-in on Tuesday as the UN Deputy Secretary-General at the UN Headquarters in New York.

Mohammed, who was appointed by the UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Dec. 15, 2016 as his deputy, was supposed to have assumed office on Jan. 1, 2017.

She, however, delayed the assumption of her new role at the request of President Muhammadu Buhari to complete some ongoing responsibilities she was handling at that time.

It will be recalled that Guterres had, while announcing Mohammed alongside two other women appointees, described them as “highly competent”.

“I am happy to count on the efforts of these three highly competent women, whom I have chosen for their strong backgrounds in global affairs, development, diplomacy, human rights and humanitarian action.

“These appointments are the foundations of my team, which I will continue to build, respecting my pledges on gender parity and geographical diversity,” Guterres had said.

The office of the UN Deputy Secretary-General was formally established by the General Assembly in 1997 to handle many of the administrative responsibilities of the Secretary-General.

As the fifth Deputy Secretary-General, Mohammed will help to manage the UN Secretariat operations, and “ensuring inter-sectoral and inter-institutional coherence of activities and programmes”.

She will also support the Secretary-General in elevating “the profile and leadership of the UN in the economic and social spheres, including further efforts to strengthen the UN as a leading centre for development policy and development assistance”.

In accepting the appointment, the then environment minister said she would continue to lay strong foundations for the various ongoing initiatives critical to the Federal Government’s success in the environment sector.