Ms. Maimunah Mohd Sharif, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director,
Following nomination by the Secretary-General, the General Assembly, on 22 December 2017, elected Maimunah Mohd Sharif of Malaysia as Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat).
She succeeds Joan Clos of Spain to whom the Secretary-General is grateful for his dedicated service to the Organization. Dr. Clos led UN-Habitat during the pivotal years when the world’s population became majority urban. During this time, he championed the development of a New Urban Agenda and Sustainable Development Goal 11 (SDG11), the first development goal focused on sustainable urbanization. His emphasis on urban planning and national urban policies has been widely appreciated and applied to plan and steer the world’s cities toward sustainability, economic and social progress and inclusion.
Ms. Sharif is currently Mayor of the City Council of Penang Island, Malaysia. Prior to her appointment as Mayor, she was the first woman to be appointed as President of the Municipal Council of Seberang Perai in 2011. As mayor of a local authority, she leads Municipal Council of Seberang Perai to achieve its vision of a “cleaner, greener, safer and healthier place to work, live, invest and play”. She is a champion of Gender Responsive Participatory Budgeting to integrate gender perspectives into the governance process as a tool to mainstream gender into budgetary and development policy and planning. During her tenure, the Municipal Council of Seberang Perai was the first Local Authority to implement and achieve six quality-based management ISO certifications.
Head of the OED:
Sub-units:
- Scientific Advisory (SA)
- Strategic Planning (SP)
- Evaluation Unit (EU)
- Legal Unit (LU)
