Abuja, Nigeria – Africa’s long-running campaign for permanent representation on the United Nations Security Council is back in focus at the 81st UN General Assembly, with leaders renewing calls to reform a body whose five permanent members have remained unchanged since 1945. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres used his final address to the General Assembly on Tuesday to renew his call for Security Council reform, saying it must become more representative and better reflect today’s geopolitical realities. Nigeria’s Vice President Kashim Shettima, delivering President Bola Tinubu’s national statement, called for at least two permanent seats for Africa, with veto powers for as long as the veto exists, as well as five non-permanent seats for the continent.
Ghana’s President John Mahama made a similar appeal: “Security Council reform is not a favour to Africa; it is an imperative for the legitimacy, credibility and survival of the United Nations”. The renewed calls highlight the scale of Africa’s demand. But translating them into an agreement that changes the Council’s structure remains a far more difficult task.
The Security Council has 15 members: five permanent members, China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States, and 10 members elected by the General Assembly for two-year terms. The five permanent members hold veto power, allowing any one of them to block a substantive Council resolution. No African country has a permanent seat.
Yet Africa remains central to much of the Council’s work. In 2025, the Council adopted 44 resolutions, including 24 under Chapter VII of the UN Charter, which covers measures such as sanctions and authorisations for the use of force. Eighteen of those 24 Chapter VII resolutions concerned Africa.
For Professor Ibrahim Gambari, a former Nigerian foreign minister and former Nigerian permanent representative to the UN, the issue is not simply one of geography. Therefore, we have the privilege of the unelected P5, which they don’t want to relinquish.” Gambari said Africa’s absence was difficult to justify given the continent’s size and the amount of Security Council business involving it. The General Assembly launched the intergovernmental negotiations process on Security Council reform in 2008.
The talks cover the Council’s size, membership categories, regional representation and the veto, and have continued through successive General Assembly sessions without agreement on the core questions. Changing the Council’s permanent membership would also require an amendment to the UN Charter. Under Article 108, that requires approval by two-thirds of the General Assembly and ratification by two-thirds of UN members, including all five permanent members.
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