U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres on Friday appointed Ghana’s Anita Kiki Gbeho as his new special representative for South Sudan and head of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS).
Gbeho succeeds the late Nicholas Haysom of South Africa. Guterres thanked Haysom for his leadership of the peacekeeping mission and his decades of service to the United Nations.
Gbeho brings more than 25 years of experience in political, humanitarian and development work within the United Nations system. Since 2024, she has served as deputy special representative in South Sudan, as well as the U.N. resident and humanitarian coordinator. She has also periodically acted as officer-in-charge of the mission.
Previously, Gbeho was deputy special representative for political affairs in the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM) from 2021 to 2023. She also served as deputy joint special representative in the African Union-United Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur (UNAMID) from 2018 to 2020.
Her earlier roles include serving as U.N. resident coordinator and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) resident representative in Namibia from 2015 to 2018. She has also held senior positions with the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in New York, Somalia and South Sudan.
Gbeho has worked in several conflict and post-conflict settings, including Angola, Cambodia, Iraq, Namibia, Somalia, South Sudan and Sudan.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in social sciences and African studies from the State University of New York and a master’s degree in international relations from the University of Ghana.
and then