The ITU is holding its once in every four years conference in Turkey for the next 2-3 weeks to elect a new management team, and lay out a new framework for its policy making and actions over the next 4 years.
From what I know, the candidates for:
Secretary General are
-Mr Hamadoun Toure (current Director of the Bureau for Telecommunications Development), Mr Matthias Kurth, from the German regulatory body, Mr. Montasser OUAILI (Tunisia), Mr. Marc Furrer (Switzerland), Mr. Roberto BLOIS MONTES DE SOUZA (Brazil) who is also the current Deputy Secretary General, and Ms Muna NIJEM (Jordan).
Deputy Secretary General are
-Mr. Carlos SÃNCHEZ (Spain), Major (Rtd) John Ray Kwabena TANDOH (Ghana), Mr. Houlin ZHAO (China) who is also the current Director of the Telecommunications Standardisation Bureau, and Dr. T. Ayhan BEYDOGAN (Turkey)
Director of Radiocommunications Standardisation Bureau
-Mr. Valery TIMOFEEV (Russian Federation) who is the current Director and is not contested
Director of the Telecommunications Standardisation Bureau
-Mr Malcolm Johnson (United Kingdom), Dr. Kishik PARK ( (Republic of Korea), Mr. Fabio BIGI (Italy), and Dr. Yuji INOUE (Japan)
Director of the Bureau for Telecommunications Development
-Mr. Abdelkrim Karim BOUSSAID (Algeria), Mr. Patrick Francis MASAMBU (Uganda), Mr. Sami Bin Sufuq AL-BASHEER (Saudi Arabia) and Ms Najat ROCHDI (Morocco)
-Member of Radiocommunications Registration Board (members of RRB)
Mr. P.K. GARG (India), Mr. Taghi SHAFIEE (Iran (Islamic Republic of), Mr. Ali R. EBADI (Malaysia), Mr. Mikhail MARSIGLIA (Venezuela), Mr. Ian Rex HUTCHINGS (New Zealand), Dr. Gerardo ZEPEDA BERMUDEZ (Honduras), Mr. Aboubakar ZOURMBA (Cameroon), Mr. Baiysh NURMATOV (Kyrgyz Republic), Ms. Martine LIMODIN (France), Mr. Momcilo R. SIMIC (Serbia), Dr. Mindaugas Zilinskas (Lithuania), Mr Shola Taylor (Nigeria), Ms Julie NAPIER ZOLLER (USA), Mr. Robert W. JONES (Canada), Mr. Wladyslaw MORON (Poland), Mr. Shahzada Alam MALIK (Pakistan) and Mr. Hassan LEBBADI (Morocco)
It will be indeed exciting to see who wins, and the future vision and direction the ITU takes. Thankfully, meetings are no longer 6 weeks long as they used to be when I last worked at the ITU (1989 Nice Plenipotentiary). Check out http://www.itu.int/newsroom/press_releases/2006/20.html for more information.
Other key issues include the adoption of the Strategic Plan, the Financial Plan and even the restructuring of the ITU from 5 elected positions to only 2. Others include the renaming of the ITU, and the creation of an Internet Group within ITU-T.