By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, September 11 -- The UN Development Program has all summer being doing its best to cover up irregularities not only in its Law and Order Trust Fund for Afghanistan, to which Inner City Press devoted a nine-part series with internal audit documents, but also another Manoj Basnyat run slush fund, the Policy Advisory and Development program.
Back on June 22, Inner City Press replied to UNDP's first answer:
1) WHY Manoj Basnyat is no longer the country director -- did this have ANYTHING to do with the LOTFA irregularities?
2) the date on which each of Basnyet, Sandeep Kumar and Ubadallah Sahibzada became aware of the irregularities and of the attached audits.
UNDP's A. R. Ghandour replied that "the previous country director of UNDP in Afghanistan, Mr. Manoj Basnyat left Afghanistan after three and half years, upon completion of his assignment."
But even then, cursory research showed the Basnyat had left his previous posting, in Bangladesh, on bad terms. Still, UNDP has hosted Basnyat in Room 2366 of its headquarters ever since. Why?
Today, Inner City Press is publishing yet more internal LOTFA audits showing no performance appraisals (click here), no c.v.'s, non-compliance with Afghanistan's own procurement laws. There is more. Watch this site.
