In June 1998, less than a month into my new employment on a United Nations project in Huambo, Angola, a country at the time on the brink of war, I determined that something needed to be done with urgency to relieve the enormous stress I was under.
This stress was caused not so much by the very insecure circumstances that surrounded me; the grinding poverty, the cynical fatalism and the fear of war.
It was caused by some very basic questions that I was asking myself: “What am I supposed to do?” “How am I supposed to do it?” “Who will support me in doing it?”
I felt that the lives of many people depended on the answers to those questions. I also felt that these were pretty basic questions, and that asking the right people for answers would be relatively easy and that the answers would be, should be, pretty straightforward.
The only reason I found myself in Huambo, after all, was to use other peoples’ money to assist in making the lives of the people in Huambo at least a little better.
In the end, however, I had to figure out the answers for myself, and in doing so, had to come up with many, many more questions. I am still searching for answers to those questions.
My first port of call was the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the agency that had planned and financed our project. I would eventually go round and round in circles but always come back to this agency.
There I met many people, immaculate people, with ready smiles and a ready promise to answer my questions.
It took me years to realise – and it took so long because first my innate belief in the basic decency of human beings had to be destroyed – that what these people were saying was: “Come let us lead you up the garden path, and, guess what?, we are going to make you pay for the journey.”
Because what these people were doing in fact was stealing.
The project that I was working on, and it was and is by no means an exception, had little, if anything, to do with making the lives of local people better. Behind an apparently legitimate façade, and unbelievable, seemingly needless complexity, it was a basic run-of-the-mill scam to siphon of development money for individual benefit.
Behind their immaculate smiles and glib rhetoric all these nice people I met from the UN really were, to put it very bluntly, but a bunch of crooks.
Not real crooks, that one can secretly admire, if one is so inclined, for their initiative and creativity, preying on the greed of others to take what is not theirs.
What we are dealing with here are bottom-feeders, unscrupulous parasites that prey on the poorest of the poor, the disenfranchised, and the victims of war, famine, drought and floods. In other words those already so burdened with the effort of basic survival that they are unable to defend themselves from further abuse by those who arrive, often unannounced and uninvited, to steal from them in the name of humanitarian and development aid.
I would come across one Erick de Mul, a thirty-odd year veteran of UNDP, and a man in a senior position, that is so convinced that UNDP has the right to plan and finance all manner of things, yet have no need to accept responsibility for the consequences of what they plan and finance, that he puts forth this argument under a UNDP letterhead, signs it and sends it out into the world with all the smug confidence of somebody that considers himself outside of and above the law.
This is a man who dealt with my questions by courageously instructing his minions to lie, deceive and threaten on his behalf. He is by all accounts a much admired and respected official of the UN system.
Almost too late I realised that it is pointless asking the crooks any questions since that would require them to admit that they are crooks and even to tell me why they are such a thing.
I thought it may be a good idea to write a book.
It was also time to inform The Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) of my misgivings.
There were however several lawyers, with whom I was also in contact, who seemed to feel that it is not recommended to place much faith in this organisation. The problem with this office, created somewhat reluctantly by the UN, only in 1994, after considerable pressure from a small number of member states, is that it is not fully independent of the system, as one would expect it to be. This meant that in effect it was subject to all the weaknesses in accountability so common with in the UN, and it appears as though it was pretty quickly co-opted to provide a façade of transparency that did not in fact exist.
As just one of many possible examples, on 02 June 2006, FOX News published an article “Report Slams UN Investigators” raising questions about the UN’s ability to investigate wrongdoing and Secretary General Kofi Annan's willingness to do so. The article details an independent investigation by Washington lawyers Jerome Ackerman and John Vanderstar into charges that that former Under-Secretary General Dileep Nair was promoting favourites in violation of UN rules and possibly doing so in return for money and sex while serving as head of OIOS. The report revealed that Nair violated UN promotion rules exactly as charged. Nevertheless, Kofi Annan ordered the case closed because the investigation apparently found no evidence that Nair received money or sex in exchange for promotions and even wrote Nair a personal letter expressing “personal dismay” for suffering “unnecessary and unmerited public innuendo.” He also ignored details in the report on how personnel at OIOS stonewalled investigators by failing to provide requested computer records and internal documents, The report stated: “To date, neither a response from OIOS to the March 2006 request nor any further OIOS documents have been provided,” and that OIOS “limited interviews of individuals who might have provided relevant information.”
Dileep Nair, refused to make himself available to investigators and dismissed the investigation as a “witch hunt.”
The leader of the investigation expressed surprise at the low level of cooperation given by OIOS, the very office charged with enforcing UN regulations.
"We did not get what we thought we would get," he told FOX News.
Misgivings that OIOS is not to be trusted seemed to bear out when my attempts between 2003 and 2005 solicited not a single response from them, apart from the occasional acknowledgement that they had received material from me.
On 30 November 2006 I wrote to them once more, more out of habit, than in the expectation of any real results:
“Christopher Burnham, (ex) UN Under-Secretary-General for Management, invites anybody, at any level, with information about UN corruption to come forward and that they will be protected. I am nevertheless unable to find out how to come forward, and exactly how people are protected except through OIOS, an institute which I do not trust and have been told not to trust. On several occasions have I informed OIOS about this issue, without response, then also informed them about my book on the matter, before and after publication also without response.”
Remarkably, on 15 January 2007, I received a response from one Ellen F. Gardner, Investigator, Investigations Division:“Our office, OIOS, received your email and document regarding a book you have written whereby you state there is corruption and misuse of foreign aid to Africa by Non-Governmental Organizations and the United Nations Agencies in particular UNDP. In order for me to look into this case would you please contact me at your earliest convenience at the telephone number below.”
Although a welcome sign of life, in a sea of indifference over many years, I still had some misgivings. In the first instance I felt that the UN should concern themselves with “corruption and misuse of foreign aid to Africa by Non-Governmental Organizations” only once it had gotten its own house in order. I do write about my own concerns on this issue reasonably extensively. I hardly believe that the United Nations has any moral authority to deal with them.
In the second instance I was afraid that the request for me to phone her would once again be an attempt to lead me up the garden path, once again at my own expense.
Therefore, expressing nevertheless my pleasure at hearing from her, I suggested that she rather call me.
It was also a way of asking, perhaps demanding, but doing so as politely as possible, that maybe the organisation should first establish a relationship of trust with me, before making any demands on me to work with them, phone them or making any commitments to them.
OIOS has since that date once again been prominent only in its silence.
One of the main problems that I have with OIOS reports, is that they tend to make large sweeping statements: “The UN has done a great deal to increase efficiency and overall accountability,” that it is working hard to “promote efficient management and reduce waste, fraud and abuse,” that it had “recommended millions in savings and recoveries for the UN and persuaded UN programme managers to implement hundreds of recommendations for improving management and internal controls,” and that “OIOS investigations also led to successful convictions of UN staff and others for fraud and stealing UN funds.”
In spite of all these claims, none of the reports ever mention any names. They tend to be so weak on specific detail that it is nearly impossible to confirm the truth of their claims one way or the other. On the rare occasions when one does manage to find some detail, it is invariably for misdemeanours. With disturbing regularity, complainants, even highly credible ones, are admonished for “harming the good name of the United Nations.”
Some reports go to such extremes not to offend anybody that it does little more than narrate the issues at hand before politely requesting the interested parties to be a bit more diligent. It seems to act entirely in the best interests, not of truth and justice, but of a corrupt and inept bureaucracy, that is self-perpetuating, self-serving and self-absorbed. OIOS often comes across as a farce, acting primarily in the interests of the multitude of the “petty despots” that abound with the UN system.
It is many of these selfsame “petty despots” that I name and that I feel that need to be investigated. For the sake of completeness these are the individuals that I personally name and believe need to answer to allegations, some of them serious: “Mark Malloch Brown, James Lee, Dimitri Samaras, Bisrat Aklilu, Michele Falavigna, Erick de Mul, Michel Balima, Stanislaus Nkwain, Stephen Kinloch, Francisco de Almeida.”
These are by and large senior UN public servants.
Dimitri Samaras for example, is an individual who as Deputy Director of the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) had received in excess of $160 000.00 to provide Administrative and Overhead Support (AOS) to our project in Huambo. With that money he may have visited the project once, although there is no confirmation of this, and had written, or instructed somebody to write, not a single report regarding the support that they were supposedly providing, nor did he ever bother to respond to concerns raised over a number of years.
When those concerns culminated in a request for an audit, he became highly indignant, claiming that a project that he clearly knew absolutely nothing about was a fantastic success, and writing: “So to question it today, as it was done by UNDP new Leadership was indeed not a plus in terms of projecting a positive image but rather was felt as some kind of “retaliation” for which UNOPS is not part of.”
If this Dimitri Samaras considers something as routine as an audit - and surely for the expenditure of more than one and a half million Dollars, an audit should be routine – as “some kind of “retaliation,” is there perhaps not some chance that he may not also consider an OIOS investigation as “some kind of “ retaliation?”
Is he likely to co-operate with this investigation?
Is OIOS capable of taking him to task?
I need some sort of assurance on these sorts of issues, and not having heard anything from OIOS in almost a month I wrote to them on 14 February 2007:
“I am following up on the e-mail that I had received from you in order to establish if you are indeed following up on this case, and if so, what progress you had made to date.
Notwithstanding the fact that I had refused to phone you (it is a matter of principle), I am nevertheless pleased that finally there seem to be at least the possibility of some meaningful progress regarding my concerns.
I am sure that not many people go through the trouble of reading all OIOS reports, but I do, and based on this as well as my previous experience of being dragged into all sorts of UN “investigations” (read cover-ups), invariably at my own expense in terms of time and money, I am reluctant to become the recipient of the apparently standard OIOS procedure that invariably finds a few token irregularities (usually in procurement), mildly admonishes the wrongdoer(s) for this, then concludes by castigating the complainant(s) for “harming the good name of the United Nations.” I would be far more co-operative once I have some confidence in the process.
I would also be very interested in finding out exactly what it is that you are investigating (or intend to investigate). Although my concerns are often framed within the context of my own experiences, they do in fact go a lot deeper than that, in the manner that funds are managed by the UN (specifically UNDP) in general. It is encouraging to read that the Secretary General has now ordered an investigation into all UN Programmes and Funds, yet it still remains to be seen to what extent it will be able to penetrate the quagmire of abuse and fraud that it is bound to encounter.
From the literature you may pick up on the fact that for a long time there had been some concern about the manner in which UNDP had decided to micro-manage the UNDP Trust Fund in Angola (worth some $100 million) and how most project proposals were not authorised even years after they had been submitted.
Locally it had been felt, and there is probably some truth in this, that the reason for this state of affairs was that all project proposals were subjected to a single requirement, and if it did not meet this requirement, then it was simply ignored by the staff at UNDP.
This requirement was “What is in it for me?”
That is probably the reason why the RUTEC project was implemented, in spite of being totally inappropriate, in spite of local objections, in spite of not following the required procedures for authorisation, why it always bounced out of the way of any audit and why such a large succession of UNDP officials went to such lengths to cover it up.
It remains nevertheless only the tip of the iceberg, maybe of importance only because one person had the courage (or stupidity) to keep on asking questions. I hope that it would contribute in its own way to having far larger concerns and questions raised and finally answered. I had perhaps to date been singularly unsuccessful in having even basic questions answered, that may be disturbing in itself, and indicative of how much may in fact be wrong within the UN system, but I am convinced that by asking questions for long enough, eventually the lack of any response will become its own answer.
Finally I would like to request your assistance in two other issues that I am following up upon.
Regarding the claim that “OIOS investigations also led to successful convictions of UN staff and others for fraud and stealing UN funds” that has made an appearance on the OIOS website and several reports over the years; I attempted to track down some such convictions.
Although my efforts have resulted in a number of interesting responses from various authorities, I have not been able to track down any specific cases. I am most interested in finding out if any staff at UN development agencies had ever been prosecuted, specifically in Africa or as a result of programmes implemented in Africa. Specific, but not necessarily comprehensive, information that can both quantify and qualify this OIOS claim would be particularly useful to me.
I am also interested in following up on the statement made by a number of Secretary General documents published in 2005 and 2006, that UN staff responsible for waste and abuse of funds would be required to reimburse the organisation for those losses.
Has this ever happened?
I hope that you would either be able to get this information for me, or alternatively put me in touch with somebody that can do so.”
It is not only important that justice is done. It is not even good enough to be told that apparently justice is being done. It has to be seen to be done. It may be highly embarrassing to the individuals involved, but claims that “investigations also led to successful convictions of UN staff and others for fraud and stealing UN funds” is virtually meaningless unless one can also follow up on who was convicted, for what, through which system of justice and what was the sentence that was passed down.
Without that the “fight against corruption” becomes but a façade; and that façade is in itself but a form of corruption.
