Nairobi, 10 May 2017—Malaysia today made an equivocal statement that they were ready to host the ninth session of the World Urban Forum next year.

At a press conference on the sidelines of the ongoing 26th Governing Council of UN-Habitat in Nairobi, Dato’ Halimah Mohamed Sadique, the vice minister for Urban Wellbeing, Housing and Local Government said the whole country was looking forward to hosting the event between February 7-13th 2018.

“The nation’s readiness to become the host city for the WUF9 will reflect Malaysia’s commitments to the world in the sustainable and livable urban development aspects. This hosting is also in line with the nation’s aspiration in implementing the SDGs, COP21 and the latest is the New Urban Agenda (NUA) which was adopted during Habitat III in Quito, Ecuador,” she said.

According to Ms. Sadique, the Kuala Lumpur event would be the first platform to debate on the implementation and achievement of the New Urban Agenda after its adoption and the first to focus on its implementation.

“WUF9 is expected to attract approximately 25,000 participants locally and abroad. It will spur the tourism industry. The Prime Minister has also inaugurated the soft launch of WUF9 at the local level to give awareness to the public and stakeholders about hosting the WUF9 and its relation to the New Urban Agenda,” she said.

She said they had established about 12 sub-committees to look into the preparatory works on substantive and logistics aspect towards a successful hosting of WUF9.

“We are hopeful that hosting of WUF9 will create a significant and meaningful legacy particularly to the urbanisation aspect of the country and is in relation to the government’s aspiration in the discourse of the National Transformation 2050 (TN50),” Ms. Sadique concluded.

On his part, UN-Habitat Executive Director Dr. Joan Clos said that he was impressed by the way Malaysia was totally motivated in hosting the event.

“UN-Habitat is committed to working with Asia and Malaysia gives us the perfect opportunity of doing so. Malaysia is one of the most vibrant economies in the world