International records / OpenAlex research

Introduction

The speeches and other statements in this collection have been selected mainly from the period of my first five years in office as Commonwealth Secretary-General. The purpose of this introductory essay is to present the background to these statements and to provide the common thread which links them. I entered the service of the Commonwealth in 1966, having been recruited from the Nigerian Diplomatic Service by Arnold Smith, the first Secretary-General, as one of a nucleus of officers to inaugurate the Secretariat. We were a happy band of pioneers, thrilled in the knowledge that we were the se…