The Annual General Meeting
By Elizabeth Bautista

The Annual General Meeting was held at Lemon Grass Restaurant on 16 March 2002. Liti Lissner called the meeting to order at 11.40 hours. She welcomed the members and thanked the officers of the outgoing board for their commitment and efforts for the association. She also thanked the new slate of officers for accepting their nominations for the Executive Board. Copies of the Constitution and By-laws of UNWA were available for reference by the members.

Minutes of the 2001 AGM (held on 17 March 2001, and published in the April 2001 WOMUN) were read by the Secretary and unanimously approved by the members.

President’s Report:   Copies of Patsy Lobo’s report during her tenure as President from April 2001 – December 2001 were circulated and read for the information of the members. Liti presented her report as pro-tem President from middle of December 2001 – to March 2002.

Welfare:  Yukiko Kukita, Chairperson, reported on the accomplishments of the Welfare Committee for the past year. This included a summary of the 20 organizations funded by UNWA from April 2001 – March 2002. Welfare Committee members were praised for the achievements of the team. Liti opened the floor for discussions. Petra Osinski from ICDDR,B raised a question of how destitute women could be assisted from their current deplorable situation.

Yukiko explained the Welfare Committee’s procedure for supporting a project: upon receipt of a project proposal from an NGO, the Welfare Committee visits, investigates and submits a recommendation to the Board on whether it can be supported by UNWA.

Treasurer:  Cornelia Saravanamuttu presented an overview of the Income and Disbursement of Accounts of UNWA from April 2001 – March 2002. A final report will be made after the Auditor checks the books. She streamlined the accounts by separating the General Fund and the Welfare fund. Liti commended the work done by Cornelia in separating the two accounts. She explained that since we are not paying for printing of WOMUN this year as UNDP is printing it for us, the Association has been able to keep within its administrative budget.

Caroline von Zoolingen from the Welfare Committee extended her appreciation to the Treasurer and the present Executive Board in sharing the report of the UNWA accounts and commented that there are a lot of future Welfare projects that the committee will be able to support. Nazneen Azim appreciated the transparency of the Treasurer’s report as this is the first time that all members were informed of the status of the accounts.

Liti introduced the Nominating Committee Chairperson, Janet Jackson, and members Geeta Sethi and Meriaty Subroto. She thanked them for their combined efforts in putting up a very good slate of new officers. Janet Jackson thanked Liti for the guidance and support she extended to the NC. It took them six weeks to scout and convince eligible candidates to the Executive Board. She thanked them for their willingness to serve and take on responsibilities. She then presented the slate of New Officers.

Liti then asked for a motion of approval of the slate by a show of hands. Members unanimously approved the slate and they were installed to office.

Members of the old board were presented with gifts as a token of their contributions to UNWA. Liti thanked Naaz Farhana Ahmed, Activities Chairperson for organizing the UNWA lunches, activities and tours around the city. Yuko Nakamura, official photographer was given a memento for her active work as photographer at UNWA activities.

Liti started a Presidential tradition of giving an "UNWA Member of the Year" award to Chisato Obikane, who maintained a perfect attendance to all the meetings, luncheons, coffee mornings and tours organized by UNWA. Liti also bade goodbye to her as the Obikanes are leaving Bangladesh for Tokyo at the end of the month.

The floor was given to the new President of UNWA, Tazeen Rehman.

Tazeen congratulated all the newly elected members of the Executive Board and said that it is her great honor to be President of UNWA Bangladesh. She thanked the Nominating Committee for their motivation and Liti for the strong support she extended her. Being involved with UNWA re-affirms her strong belief in UN issues and it is good that such group is willing voluntarily to do something good for Bangladesh.

We have a wealth of knowledge and commitment she said, and with the strong foundation laid by the old board, she is looking forward to a cooperative effort by the members and concrete proposals to help UNWA and its activities. She hopes to involve more members in the organization and to widen up the scope of membership.

She appreciated the work done by the Welfare Committee and said that all UNWA members have done a significant impact by contributing to the activities of UNWA. She then thanked the members of the outgoing Executive Board.

The meeting was adjourned at 12.45 hours.

A lovely lunch was served by the Lemon Grass Restaurant.