All Things Whistleblower: A GAP Blog

Clarifications regarding media reports about Ismail Ahmed

Various media outlets have recently reported that GAP whistleblower Ismail Ahmed suffered retaliation after alerting authorities to the United Nations Development Program’s (UNDP) support of a company with links to Islamic militants in Somalia. This is misleading.

Dr. Ahmed was subject to retaliation after providing evidence of corruption involving KPMG and the Somalia country office of UNDP. He tried to alert UNDP to this apparent wrongdoing three times:

• On March 2006, through UNDP’s Fraud Hotline
• In October 2006, to UNDP country office management
• In November 2007, to the UNDP Administrator, with copy to UNDP’s Office of Audit and Investigations (OAI)

The retaliation against Dr. Ahmed began after his October 2006 disclosure and is ongoing.

In April 2008, Dr. Ahmed gave a much more extensive dossier – which contained information about UNDP’s alleged support of a company with suspected links to militant Islamic organizations – to a unit within the United Nations Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS). Dr. Ahmed has not provided UNDP with a complete version of this dossier, which documents the extent of the retaliation he faced and corruption he witnessed, because he made his disclosure externally to OIOS in order to prevent possible destruction of evidence inside UNDP. Dr. Ahmed had reason to believe that an attempt to destroy evidence would be made by specific individuals inside UNDP because this had in fact occurred after his October 2006 disclosure. Although Dr. Ahmed notified OIOS and the UNDP Somalia country office management of his concerns regarding UNDP’s support of a company with suspected links to terrorist organizations, he did not submit his evidence of these links to OAI.

-- Shelley Walden

Folsom's Replacement

The World Bank has selected a new director for its Department of Institutional Integrity (INT), the Bank office charged with investigating internal corruption. The new director, Leonard McCarthy, previously served as the head of South Africa’s “Scorpion” investigative unit, which has brought numerous corruption charges against various African officials.

McCarthy will replace Suzanne Rich Folsom, a former close aide of Paul Wolfowitz, who announced her resignation in January. GAP released a report last September detailing how Folsom’s dual positions as INT Director and Counselor to the President were a blatant conflict of interest, among other serious issues at the department.

-- Dylan Blaylock

The World Bank’s Terrible Lack of Action

After nearly one year’s delay, the World Bank announced that it will further investigate disclosures involving the distribution of defective HIV/AIDS test kits, purchased by one of its health care projects in India. GAP client Dr. Kunal Saha first informed the Bank of the use of the faulty kits in May 2007.

The World Bank’s delayed actions involving this case have been alarming, inadequate, and failed to ensure Indian public health. The Washington Post first reported on this story back in October, but little was done then.

There are more details about this case that must come out publicly, and GAP will work to ensure that they do.

-- Dylan Blaylock

And Then There Was One

Ana Palacio, World Bank General Counsel, announced her resignation yesterday. A key member of former Bank President Paul Wolfowitz’s inner circle, Palacio was dubbed as being part of the ‘Gang of Six’ – the top Wolfowitz backers at the Bank. From the Washington Post:

Former World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz appointed Palacio, who was Spain's foreign minister back when Spain was a member of the Coalition of the Willing, in June 2006. Wolfowitz resigned under pressure a year later after an uprising by bank employees over his management style and his involvement in obtaining a fine post for a pal.

His top aides, Kevin Kellums and Robin Cleveland, left around that time. Suzanne Rich Folsom, who had been at the bank earlier but was promoted by Wolfowitz to be anti-corruption chief, left in January.

Only one member of the ‘Gang’ now remains at the Bank: Juan José Daboub. He is a Managing Director and Wolfowitz-hire that GAP exposed as attempting to remove references and funding for “family planning” in Bank projects, possibly to make health care projects conform to his personal religious beliefs.

-- Dylan Blaylock

Google Censors Media Outlet Supportive of UN Whistleblowers

Internet goliath Google has discontinued listing stories from Inner City Press, a United Nations-focused media organization, through its Google News program. In GAP's opinion, Inner City Press is the most effective and important media organization for UN whistleblowers.

Several important UN whistleblower claims and stories that are not picked up by mainstream media outlets are covered thoroughly by Inner City Press. This outlet’s continued coverage of important issues of accountability result in outside pressure and real, effective change to strengthen worker rights at the international body.

In the wake of media pressure, Google has stated that it will put Inner City Press back up on the Google News Search in a week or so.

Looking at what originally transpired, however, in a short, nondescript email sent to Inner City Press last week, Google stated the following:

“We periodically review news sources, particularly following user complaints, to ensure Google News offers a high quality experience for our users. When we reviewed your site we've found that we can no longer include it in Google News.”

What interesting about this statement is the ‘user complaints’ notion. Just who would be complaining about Inner City Press? The outlet definitely has its enemies…

For example, one key story the Inner City Press has been covering is the continuing controversy surrounding corruption, fraud and abuse of authority at the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). During 2007, GAP received allegations from four UNDP whistleblowers who had been subjected to retaliation as UNDP management sought to destroy the careers of people who exposed serious misconduct. Using administrative and bureaucratic maneuvers, UNDP has thus far escaped accountability for cronyism at the highest levels, diversion of funds, improper sole-source bidding, and political interference in the affairs of UNDP by a member state. Inner City Press has been the most reliable and consistent source of coverage on this issue.

Click here to check out GAP’s full press release.

-- Dylan Blaylock

United States Senate Committee Issues an Investigative Report on the United Nations Development Program

The United States Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has just released a report entitled “United Nations Development Program: A Case Study of North Korea.’

The report will be discussed at a hearing today, starting at 10 a.m., that will focus on allegations of corruption in the UNDP North Korea office, including those raised by GAP whistleblower Artjon Shkurtaj, who was terminated after he reported serious allegations of wrongdoing related to the UNDP North Korea office.

The report found that “by preventing access to its audits and not submitting to the jurisdiction of the UN Ethics Office, UNDP impeded reasonable oversight and undermined its whistleblower protections.” (p.1) The subcommittee also found that “UNDP refused to submit Mr. Shkurtaj’s retaliation claim to the UN Ethics Office, thereby weakening its status and authority, causing the fracture of what was intended to be a UN-wide ethics program, and undermining confidence that UNDP employees can report suspected mismanagement without fear of reprisal.” (pp. 27-28) The investigative committee recommends that “Both Congress and the US State Department should continue to press for the implementation of strong whistleblower protections at the UNDP and throughout the United Nations,” (p.5) a proposal that GAP fully agrees with.

GAP is quoted on page 27 of this report.

-- Shelley Walden

UN Ethics Office Fails to Help Whistleblower

A whistleblower that exposed the UN Development Program’s diversion of funds from African to European companies is not being given anti-retaliation protection from the UN Ethics Office.

This is another case of the UN stating that since the UNDP is a program of the UN, it is allowed to develop its own ethics rules, and therefore not subject to the jurisdiction of the UN Ethics Office or the whistleblower protections outlined in the UN's “Protection from retaliation for reporting misconduct and for cooperating with duly authorized audits and investigations” (ST/SGB/2005/21)” policy, which would offer protection. This change was heavily criticized by GAP last month.

-- Dylan Blaylock

Folsom Out

Suzanne Rich-Folsom, controversial head of the World Bank’s Department of Institutional Integrity (INT) which is charged with investigating and acting on internal Bank corruption, has resigned her position, effective immediately. This move comes just four months after GAP released an INT review critical of Folsom’s actions at the Bank.

Folsom’s departure comes after increasing criticism of her own integrity and effectiveness from a variety of sources besides GAP, including a Bank commissioned report from a panel headed by Paul Volcker, and a rising tide of dissatisfaction among her staff.

GAP had several problems with Folsom. Perhaps chiefly among them was that she served in controversial dual positions as both Wolfowitz counselor and INT Director. Given that Wolfowitz himself was involved in wrongdoing that led to his resignation, it is obvious that holding both positions was unethical and an obvious conflict of interest.

Check out GAP’s full press release and other articles (Financial Times, EarthTimes, Reuters).

-- Dylan Blaylock

Report on World Bank Indian Project Shows Corruption

The results of a World Bank probe into Bank project-related corruption in India were announced on Friday. According to the Bank “serious incidents of fraud and corruption” have occurred in several projects over the last 11 years, involving hundreds of millions of dollars.

The announcement of this report comes a few months after one GAP client blew the whistle on World Bank funds in India being used to purchase defective HIV test kits, putting the population at risk. These defective HIV test kits give out false negative reading, meaning that they do often show infected, unsafe blood as being clean and acceptable for transfusions.

Thus far, although assurances have been made to GAP staff by World Bank officials that actions would be taken to fix the problem, GAP has seen little proof that anything has been accomplished whatsoever – meaning that an unknown number of Indians could potentially still be being put at risk.

GAP is working to pressure the World Bank to fix this problem.

-- Dylan Blaylock

Ban Ki-moon's Words Ring Hollow

Earlier this week, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stated that the international body needs “greater investigative powers,” according to Reuters. Ki-moon is quoted in the same article as stating “I think the United Nations needs some strengthened investigative capacity.”

Good sentiments for sure. It seems to allude to the notion that Ki-moon wants to bring real accountability to the United Nations, presumably to route out corrupt practices within it (Ki-moon acknowledged several frauds that have taken place).

Unfortunately, his words have a rather hollow tone to them, as they are at odds with his action last month of issuing a lame, new UN ethics bulletin. The bulletin allows UN programmes to establish different ethics standards and policies, without establishing minimum standards for those policies. This would allow UN programmes to exempt themselves from the ethical standards that were established under former Secretary-General Kofi Annan (ST/SGB/2005/21 and ST/SGB/2005.22). The new bulletin complicates and confuses the issue, creating an entirely new level of bureaucratic dispute, delay, cost and inefficiency for those who report corruption in UN operations and suffer retaliation as a result. It’s wrong, and subpar, on several levels. Ironically, the UN has touted this reform as one of the Secretary-General’s most significant accomplishments in his first year of office.

It would be nice to see the Secretary-General get real about providing whistleblower protections to all UN staffers. Until he does, a lot of his accountability comments are simply rhetoric.

-- Dylan Blaylock