{"id":49606,"date":"2026-10-31T09:16:40","date_gmt":"2026-10-31T07:16:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=49606"},"modified":"2026-10-31T10:02:10","modified_gmt":"2026-10-31T08:02:10","slug":"who-names-seven-candidates-for-director-general","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/who-names-seven-candidates-for-director-general\/","title":{"rendered":"WHO names seven candidates for Director General \u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The World Health Organisation (WHO) has formally published the list of candidates nominated by member states to lead the global health agency, setting the stage for the election of its next Director-General.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Seven candidates are competing to succeed Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus when his second and final five-year term ends in August 2027. The nominee list represents a broad international field of public health officials, Ministers, and senior diplomats.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Among the contenders are two former WHO regional directors: Dr Hanan Balkhy of Saudi Arabia, who currently heads the Eastern Mediterranean region, and Dr Hans Henri P. Kluge of Belgium, the current Director for Europe. Qatar has nominated its former Minister of Public Health, Dr Hanan Mohammed Al-Kuwari, while Spain has put forward Dr Mar\u00eda P. Neira, a long-serving Director of the WHO\u2019s Department of Environment, Climate Change and Health.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The slate of nominees is rounded out by Indonesian Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin, Chinese maternal health specialist Dr Li Song, and Armenian paediatric oncologist Dr Gevorg Tamamyan, who was nominated by Botswana.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The candidates will address member states and the public during an official candidate forum at WHO headquarters in Geneva in November 2026. Following interviews and evaluations, the WHO Executive Board will narrow the field in early 2027 before submitting its final nominations to the World Health Assembly in May 2027 for the official vote.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;ChannelAfrica\/WHO&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20673,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[78,26],"class_list":["post-49606","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"WHO publishes official candidate list for next Director General","published_date":"2026-10-31 08:44:57","news_description":"WHO publishes official candidate list for next Director General","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/49606","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/49606\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49608,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/49606\/revisions\/49608"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49606"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=49606"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}