EI welcomes the election of Guy Ryder as Director-General of the ILO
General Secretary Fred van Leeuwen congratulated Guy Ryder on his election to a five-year term at the helm of the UN tripartite labour organisation.
“As workers, we are delighted. Guy Ryder knows that trade unions are one of the main pillars of democratic, economically sound, and socially just societies,” said Fred van Leeuwen. EI will work with the ILO and Guy Ryder to strengthen social dialogue between governments, employers and workers representatives to secure decent work, safe conditions of work, living wages, quality public services, basic social security, inclusion and equality for all. Together with the ILO, EI and teacher unions will continue to call for better global governance and universal application and enforcement of international labour standards.
Guy Ryder, now only in his mid-fifties, has some thirty years of experience at senior positions in the international level whether at the ILO or as General Secretary of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions. Since September 2010, Mr Ryder was ILO’s Executive Director responsible for International Labour Standards, overseeing the supervision of the application of ILO Conventions and Recommendations. Mr Ryder received 30 of the 56 votes of the titular members of the ILO’s Governing Body. The vote was conducted at the ILO’s headquarters in Geneva on 28 May. There were eight other candidates for the position. The election was scheduled by the ILO Governing Body following the announcement by Juan Somavia, current Director-General of the ILO, that he was advancing the date of his departure. Guy Ryder will officially become the tenth Director-General of the ILO in October 2012.
