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Message From the Director RSCE
Message From the Director RSCE
Dear Colleagues,
Welcome to the latest edition of our quarterly newsletter. In this 14th edition, I will share some updates relevant to our work and a few highlights covering the first quarter of 2024.
In January, the Government of Uganda requested RSCE support to help with the extensive coordination effort required to host the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) and Group of 77 + China Summits that took place in Uganda from 15 to 23 January 2024. As a result, many of you were asked to work from home, and I must thank you for continuing to serve our clients diligently and satisfactorily during this time.
We were very delighted to host the President of the UN General Assembly, Mr. Dennis Francis and the UN Secretary General, Mr. Antonio Guterres on Sunday 21 January alongside the UN country Team in Uganda here at the RTCC. While delivering his remarks, the SG congratulated Entebbe as a duty station for a job well done and mentioned that Entebbe is a very important element of the support architecture of the UN secretariat. You can view the video on his visit here.
We had a Senior Management Retreat in February where we reviewed the RSCE vision and strategy and reassessed the Centre’s workplan and risk registry considering the changing geopolitical landscape affecting Peacekeeping, the UN financial constraints, the sustainability of the RSCE and how best to leverage emerging technologies.
As mentioned at our first townhall of the year, the recent drawdown and mission closures are bound to affect the Centre with a reduction of our footprint. It is a challenging period, and we should all work hard collectively to continue to demonstrate a positive value proposition which will be helpful in attracting more business for the Centre.
We shall, however, be taking on more responsibilities in Entebbe as we transition the operations of the Entebbe UN campus from MONUSCO to RSCE.
On a positive note, we launched a new nursing room for newly born UN babies. This room has been set aside and furnished to facilitate new mothers in nursing and caring for their children at feeding times.
The Forward Support and Deployment Hub (FSDH) sourced tactical airlift support from Canada in February for the third time. The Tactical Airlift Detachment (TAL DET) arrived in Entebbe on 10 February 2024 for two weeks and consisted of a Royal Canadian Air Force CC-130J Hercules aircraft, operated and supported by 19 Canadian Armed Forces members. They transported up to 60,000 kg of cargo to the UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO) and the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS).
We celebrated Women’s Day over a period of a week, and I want to thank the committee that put this together, job well done. I extend my appreciation to our women leaders who took time out of their busy schedule to mentor 10 students and to inspire them to great things in the future. This was an investment well placed as evidenced from their testimonies during the townhall on 8th March.
During the townhall, I promised to donate computers to each of the schools that attended our celebration, and we shall be handing these over soon with the hope that the computers will help children sharpen their writing skills.
Finally, I thank all that have contributed to the previous editions of the RSCE Newsletters and the communications team for their efforts to make it happen. If you have an interesting story, contact the RSCE Communications Team through rsce-communications@un.org .
