GENEVA -- IFAD President Gilbert Houngbo was elected Friday as the next Director-General of the International Labour Organization by the ILO Governing Body, the ILO said.

  The former Togolese prime minister will start his new post at the Geneva-based organisation in October, meaning that IFAD will have to hold elections for a new president, diplomatic sources said.

  Houngbo defeated rival candidates from Australia, South Africa, South Korea and France.

   The imminent departure of Houngbo, who was only elected to a second term as IFAD president last year, raises the prospect of the UN agency being led in the interim by German vice-president Dominic Ziller.

   ZIller raised eyebrows last year when his reputed Nigerian girlfriend NadineGbossa was appointed by Houngbo to a newly created job as Director of Food Systems Coordination based in the office of the FAO DG, a specially created post to allow her to remain in Rome while dozens of staffers were forced to leave the Italian capital or quit under a harsh decentralisation policy.

 jf