Secretary-General appoints Ms. Lila Pieters Yahia of Canada as the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Mauritania

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appointed Lila Pieters Yahia of Canada as the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Mauritania, with the host Government’s approval. She took up her post on 7 November.

Ms. Pieters Yahia has devoted more than 20 years to public service. She previously served as the United Nations Resident Coordinator ai in Armenia, Equatorial Guinea, and Tunisia. Where jointly with the UN teams, she led the support to governments and other partners on the implementation of the COVID-19 pandemic response, food, energy and finance crises, UN Agenda 2030, and AU Agenda 2063 and humanitarian crises and response. Ms. Pieters Yahia also coordinated the UN reform roll out and development and management of new generation of United Nations Cooperation Framework. 

She has extensive experience in establishing partnerships notably with international financial institutions, the private sector, civil society, women, and youth. Ms. Pieters Yahia also accompanies national authorities with their economic reform programmes to address their development needs including achieving the SDGs, implement institutional reforms in public administration, security sector, the fiscal, monetary, and financial sector policy areas and create fiscal space to increase priority spending on human rights and gender, climate change and green jobs, education, health, social protection and agriculture and food security. 

Prior to joining in 2020, the United Nations Secretariat, Lila Pieters Yahia held numerous positions at UNICEF in Africa, Europe, and Asia, including Country Representative in Tunisia. She focused the policy dialogue on the development agenda and the realization of every child rights. She has also a track record working with governments on their reforms agenda including in public finance and strengthening national systems to deliver quality services to women, children, and youth. In addition, she has demonstrated her adeptness at effective management, innovation and caring for multicultural and multidisciplinary teams. 

Ms. Pieters Yahia obtained her master’s degree in Economics from the London School of Economics, London, UK.

She is a proud mother of two young men.