On 18 September 2026, in a closed vote of the UN Security Council, Rebeca Grynspan received nine votes in favor, five against, and one without an opinion. This is the third informal poll, and she has come out ahead again, but with the same number of opponents as before.
What is at stake here is not a personal victory, but whether any of the candidates can pass through the filter of the five permanent members of the Council. Without their unanimous consent, no poll result has any force. Grynspan has now shown nine votes of support for the second time — the threshold needed for a formal recommendation — yet the five votes against signal persistent objections.
Grynspan is a former Vice President of Costa Rica, the current head of UNCTAD, an economist with experience in international organizations. Her career was built on the ability to find compromises between developing countries and Western donors. In the past, she has already taken part in difficult negotiations on trade and development, where success depended not on loud statements but on the ability to retain the support of different groups at the same time.
In the current poll, she is ahead of Guyana's Ambassador Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett by just one vote. In the second round, the lead belonged to Rodrigues-Birkett. Such a shift in positions shows how unstable the preferences of Council members are and how strongly current geopolitical calculations influence them.
Grynspan's five votes against mean that at least one of the permanent members has already expressed disagreement. In the real process, one veto is enough to stop a candidate. Her advantage in the poll gives her a position for negotiations, but it does not guarantee passage through the filter of the "five."
The process resembles a chess game in which the pieces are moved by invisible hands: each country votes with an eye on allies and opponents, and not only on the qualities of the candidate. For now, Grynspan holds the balance better than others, but that balance remains fragile.
In the end, leadership in an informal poll shows not the strength of a candidate, but the limits that the structure of the Security Council imposes on any choice of a new Secretary-General.
