South African Local Government Association (Salga) president Parks Tau has joined the United Nations (UN) high level independent panel to oversee the effectiveness of UN-Habitat – a programme that promotes socially and environmentally sustainable towns and cities. 

His appointment follows the adoption of the New Urban Agenda at the Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, which is known as Habitat III, and was held in Ecuador, in October last year. 

The independent panel assessment is a part of the follow-up and review that was recommended as one of Habitat III’s outcome and it will contain recommendations on enhancing the effectiveness, efficiency, accountability and oversight of UN-Habitat. 
 
Tau described his new role on the UN panel as that of being an instrument to advance the interests of local government on a local and international scale. 

“Having committed to advocate for the location of local government at the centre of a changing world, the panel presented an opportunity to lead this agenda – hence it is a welcome platform by the local government sphere,” he said. 

Tau, until recently mayor of Johannesburg, added that the agenda relates to localising and financing the post-2015 Development Agenda, developing a collaborative local coherence agenda on peace, safety and security, as well as leading a local narrative around migrancy, displacement and social cohesion.

The panel’s UN-Habitat assessment report will serve as input to a two-day High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly to be convened by the UN President of the General Assembly, Peter Thomson, during the seventy-first session in September this year. The meeting will further discuss the effective implementation of the New Urban Agenda and the positioning of UN-Habitat. 
 
Joining Tau on the new panel are architect Peter Calthorpe, permanent representative of Indonesia to the UN Ambassador Dian Triansyah Djani, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo, Society for Promotion of Area Resource Centres founder and director Sheela Patel, Mexico’s Agrarian Territorial and Urban Development secretary Rosario Robles Berlanga, permanent representative of the Slovak Republic to the UN Ambassador František Ružicka; and Lesotho Minister of Health and Social Welfare Pontso Sekatle.