For UN's Ebola Mission, Acting Chief Tells Inner City Press of Air Transport Logistics, Training, Unprecedented Speed

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, September 18 -- At the Ebola meeting of the UN Security Council where UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced the establishment of a UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER), many were confused about what the mission will do, who will pay for it, and how it came about.

 Inner City Press spoke with the UN's Ebola Operation Crisis Manager Tony Banbury who explained that the new mission moved from idea on Sunday, September 14 to announcement four days later. A two-page concept paper was prepared, which Ban Ki-moon approved.

 The ideas range from providing training through the World Health Organization to all who will go in to help, to mobilizing transportation for equipment. The General Assembly will be asked for funds, and countries will be asked what they can contribute.

 Banbury indicated the speed with which this is moving is unprecedented, exactly what's needed and what the UN should be doing.

 Inner City Press asked Banbury, as it had at the day's UN noon briefing, about Sierra Leone's three day shut-in to try to stop the spread of ebola. Banbury said it is not really a shut-in but an attempt to reach out and educate people on what is necessary to not spread Ebola.

 Banbury said helicopters will be needed in Sierra Leone and Guinea but not in Liberia, to which the US is committing 3,000 troops. He specifically praised Cuba for sending doctors. A long time official of the UN's Department of Field Support, he said moves have begun to transfer unused and underused UN Peacekeeping equipment from other missions over to West Africa.

 Upon further inquiry elsewhere, it was suggested that it might not be easy to convince Sudan to allow “Western” aircraft into Darfur to pick up under-used vehicles for transfer to the Ebola mission in Western Africa. But that might be a test, both for Sudan and for the UN. We'll have more on this.

   

To UN's 11th Hour Africa Union Proposal, Russia Says Too Late, Procuring Votes

By Matthew Russell Lee
http://www.innercitypress.com/pk1budget052710.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 27 -- In the UN budget committee, the day before its session on peacekeeping is to end, a proposal for a $10 million office in Addis Ababa was turned in. The African Group immediately "regret[ted] the timing of the submission of the report... the afternoon of the day before the scheduled last day of the second resumed 64th session of the General Assembly."

The Ban Ki-moon administration has seven months to prepare and submit the proposal, but waited until the 11th hour.

The Russian delegate said perhaps we will not even be able to discuss this proposal, there are other issues we must address before the end. These include a proposal to restructure the Department of Field Support.

Russia is opposing that, Inner City Press has learned, because of the proposal to decentralize procurement of services including air services. Russia has cornered that market while the contracts have been doled out in New York; it would be less certain if decentralized.

Some delegates say Russia's position on the Addis Ababa office might not be unrelated to its fight to retain control of UN air contracts. But the Ban Ki-moon Administration's inept late submission was making this gambit easy -- intentionally?

Making the proposal for the Ban Administration was Taye-Brook Zerihoun, who recently replaced, if only temporarily, Haile Menkios on this day represented the UN at the inauguration of Sudan's Omar al Bashir, indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court.

Zerihoun, rather than addressing the delay to the penultimate day of the Ban Administration's proposal, apologized for his boss Lynn Pascoe not being there. He had planned to be present, Zerihoun said, but had to rush a few hours ago to go with Ban on his trip to Africa.

The argument then was that although the UN's actual plan for Africa was slapped together at the last moment, Ban's flight to Africa shows his commitment. He will play soccer with Yoweri Museveni and Nicholas Cage in Uganda -- where students are preparing to protect his and the UN's and ICC's inaction on human rights abuses -- and later to attended the opening of the World Cup in South Africa.

So is this proposed merged office in Addis Ababa nothing but a political football?

The Department of Field Support restructuring proposal is also, for now, being opposed by large troop contributing countries Pakistan and India. DFS chief Malcorra is said to be arguing that it is not worth trying to do the reforms piecemeal. So perhaps nothing will be passed.

Chairing the meeting was Peter Maurer of Switzerland, who has been moonlighting this month as a Swiss minister. He ended the meeting by saying he will"consult with the Bureau" given the views expressed. As he left the Conference Room, Maurer chatted with Zerihoun. Why turn in an ostensibly important proposal so late? Watch this site.

And see, http://www.innercitypress.com/pk1budget052710.html

UN Peacekeeping Gives CISCO Access to Its Cairo Meetings, Roots of No-Bid Contracting

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1cisco052108.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 19 -- A U.S.-based computer company with, already, $90 million in UN business was allowed exclusive access to a recent Peacekeeping Information Technology conference in Egypt, rather than being referred for performance review or investigation, it has emerged.

In what some attendees call a junket, UN peacekeeping's Department of Field Support earlier this month held a conference about information technology in Cairo, Egypt. Sources told Inner City Press they were surprised and troubled at the high-profile presence including as a provider of entertainment at the intra-UN meeting of the large contractor, CISCO, via its global account manager to the U.N., David Andemicael. Such corporate access would not be allowed, at least under the rules, by the UN's Procurement Division. So why does UN Peacekeeping -- or its Department of Field Support -- allow it?

Inner City Press sent this question to DFS's information technology chief Rudy Sanchez as well as to the new head of DFS, Susana Malcorra. The first day passed without response. But on May 20, DFS spokesman Nick Birnback provided a lengthy response:

"Hi Matthew, Ms. Malcorra asked me to get back to you on your queries of yesterday. The United Nations Secretariat has a direct contractual agreement with CISCO Systems. This agreement was developed in compliance with United Nations Financial and Procurement rules and regulations and has been in place since February 2004. The Secretariat has standardized the use of CISCO products and technology for Network equipment used in field mission’s Local Area Networks (LANs) and the DFS Wide Area Network (WAN). Field mission Information and Communications Technology (ICT) personnel indicated that one of the most pressing technical issues was network performance related to the transmission of voice, video and data over mission LANs and the WAN, and the optimization of CISCO technologies currently in use.

CISCO representatives were therefore invited to the conference to provide technical briefings to the UN participants on the utilization of CISCO technologies that would mitigate performance degradation associated with the high-latency, low-bandwidth infrastructure in use in field operations. CISCO engineers also provided technical briefings on how their equipment could best be leveraged in support of field ICT operations. CISCO representatives only participated only in this phase of the conference.

While there were no other non-UN participants in attendance this year, major UN contractors/technical service providers have participated on an issue-specific basis in previous conferences. "

This answer, while appreciated, raises more questions. Sources tell Inner City Press that CISCO's "network performance," now proffered as the rationale for its exclusive access to decision-makers, is a performance issue, which should have been referred to the Procurement Division. What CISCO provides, they say, is often incompatible with UN Peacekeeping missions.

How long has CISCO worked for the UN? Since at least 1992, Inner City Press is told, beginning with routers costing (then) $30,000. But CISCO was soon made the UN de facto standard, so that other contractors could not compete. It has been, in essence, no-bid ever since, culminating in being invited to UN Peacekeeping's own information technology conference. It is credible that CISCO will be subjected to legitimate competition for UN contracts going forward? What do the powers that be at the UN have to say about this?

Footnotes: it's now said that the acting chief of the Procurement Division, Paul Buades, may not in fact get the post, that "an Australian from UNOPS" is now in line, and even Buades' Ukrainian deputy is on the rocks, his partying picture circulating through capitals of the countries for but not in which the UN buys millions of dollars of goods.

Meanwhile, the UN has erroneously jumped the gun on promising Spain that its Peacekeeping Information Technology unit will be in Valencia -- without Budget Committee approval of any kind. Hopefully that Committee will look into Valencia, and also into this. We'll see.

Finally, insiders describe a trend in which information technology staffers of UN Peacekeeping now Department of Field Suppport leaves and go to work with the companies which contract with the UN. Where are the safeguards? Partying with CISCO...

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1cisco052108.html

UN's Jane Holl Lute Admits No-Bid Lockheed Martin Deal Caused "Confusion," Says No Conflict of Interest In Iraq and Afghan Overlap with Husband's Role

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un2lockheed020708.html

UNITED NATIONS, February 7 -- One hundred days after Lockheed Martin was granted a $250 million no-bid contract by the UN, the main proponent of the contract, the American officer-in-charge of the Department of Field Support, Jane Holl Lute, acknowledged that the lack of competition had caused confusion. While the UN General Assembly by a vote of 142 to 1, with only the United States dissenting, voted to express concern about the no-bid contract, Ms. Lute on Thursday claimed that the process had been transparent. Inner City Press asked, How so? "You have it in your hand," Ms. Lute replied, referring to documents that became public only after being leaked to Inner City Press by whistleblowers.

Following the UN's claim that the sole source process began only after the Security Council's July 31 resolution authorizing the hybrid UN-African Union Darfur force, UNAMID, Inner City Press obtained an April 2007 memo from Ms. Lute pushing Lockheed's Pacific Architects & Engineers subsidiary for a sole source contract. Is that confusion or contradiction? Ms. Lute replied at some length, to her credit, that the April no-bid contract was for the so-called Heavy Support Package, but has ended up being regularized by a Ban Ki-moon edict waving all procurement rules for the UNAMID mission. The General Assembly heard this story, behind closed doors, in December and still voted to express concern and call for an investigation into the waiving of procurement and hiring rules. "If the member states have questions in this regard," Ms. Lute said, she'll be happy to answer them. But where?

In fact, the push to give Lockheed the sole-source Darfur contract stretches even further back, to late 2006. Inner City Press has obtained copies of letters to this effect from U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and from DPKO's Jean-Marie Guehenno. Ms. Lute's February 7 story does not appear to account for these documents, nor for what Inner City Press is hearing about a "bridge" $10 million payment to Lockheed, ostensibly from the African Union but actually paid out by the United Nations. We'll have more on this.

Ms. Lute was asked if she wants to remain as Under Secretary General of DFS, a post that the UN's budget says should go to a developing country. Lute said she would like the job, but it is not up to her. Asked to state her understanding of the budget provision, she said "I have no understanding other than what the reality is." Video here, from Minute 40:34. But reality is apparently whatever you say it is. Inner City Press asked if it wasn't a conflict of interest that her husband serves of President Bush's war czar for Afghanistan and Iraq. "I absolutely deny that there is any conflict... There is absolutely no overlap," she said.

(The UN's write-up's pat summary is that Ms. Lute "dismissed a reporter's concern that she had a possible conflict of interest in her United Nations role because her husband, Lt. General Douglas Lute, was the United States' Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan." But the concern is not only this reporter's -- it is frequently expressed by diplomats, though Lute has apparently never before been asked about it.)

Inner City Press asked about her recent trip to Afghanistan, a country for which her husband is the U.S. war czar. Are the UN's and U.S.'s position so in sync that there is not even the appearance of a conflict of interest? Ms. Lute acknowledged the trip, which was little publicized other than by a U.S. military photographer. She went on to say that, in one of the few differences with the Department of Peacekeeping Operations from which DFS was with so much fanfare split off, DFS is responsible for the the logistics for all 23 of the UN's "Special Political Missions." But one of the largest SPM's is that in Iraq, including the proposal, slated to be considered this Spring, that the UN spend $180 million to construct a UN "bunker" in the Green Zone in Baghdad. No appearance of conflict?

On DFS, Ms. Lute predicted that the decision on who will be Under Secretary General will be made neither in hours nor in months. UN sources, including military advisers at Permanent Five members of the Security Council, cast their bets on the Argentine logistics expert of the UN World Food Program. "There is a Pakistani," one military adviser told Inner City Press, "but it is not their UN Ambassador Munir Akram." Would another head of DFS not push so hard for sole-source Lockheed contracts? "I have no understanding, only what the reality is." We will continue to follow this.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un2lockheed020708.html

At the UN, Alleged Abuser of Staff Seeks Transfer from Pension Fund to Chad Peacekeeping Mission

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/dfs2unjspf010908.html

UNITED NATIONS, January 9 -- At the UN, when a supervisor is repeatedly accused of abusive behavior toward the staff he supervises, the answer seems to be to arrange a transfer to another unit of the UN system and to another country, most often in Africa. This is the case of Peter Goddard, whose rocky tenure as Executive Officer of the UN Joint Staff Pension Fund, which culminated earlier this month in a formal Staff Union complaint to the UN Department of Management, is now slated to end or be interrupted on January 15. After that, Goddard is slated to ship out to Chad, with the UN peacekeeping mission there. In exchange for taking on this problem, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) has reportedly arranged to shift a person with a temporary and expiring contract, Sevil Alirzayeva, into Goddard's position. "These type of swaps are done all the time at the UN," a DPKO source tells Inner City Press, "particularly by the Department of Field Support."

Documents obtained by Inner City Press show that as far back as June 2007, the Staff Union complained of Peter Goddard's "humiliation" and "intimidation" of budget officer Mathew Biju George, and expressly of "discrimination." As raised in writing to Pension Fund CEO Bernard Cocheme, Goddard's behavior escalated until, on December 17, 2007, he jabbed his finger in Mathew George's face, ordering him first out of his office, then blocking his only exit through the door. Inner City Press has previously reported on Goddard's treatment of at least two other Pension Fund staff members, one of whom he told he would have escorted out of the building by security guards after twenty year's service to the UN.

Since Bernard Cocheme did nothing to stop or even investigate Goddard's intimidation, the complaint was raised on January 3, 2008 to the Staff Union and to Alicia Barcena, Under Secretary General for Management, chief investigator Inga-Britt Ahlenius and Ban Ki-moon's chef de cabinet Vijay Nambiar. An investigation by Ms. Ahlenius' office was requested, the Staff Union representative writing that "Mr. Goddard is in the point of going on mission assignment... With due regard to several past similar complaints involving Mr. Peter Goddard's abuses of staff, I would appreciate it if Mr. Goddard's mission detail is delayed." Ms. Barcena has said she will not stop it. Ms. Ahlenius claims she has not heard of the request.

The referenced assignment is to the MINURCAT mission in Chad and the Central African Republic, an operation meant to support the UN's stalled deployment of peacekeepers to Sudan's Darfur region. Several sources, including in DPKO, expressed concern that an individual with live cases of abuse would be sent by the UN on such a politically sensitive mission. These sources assert that DPKO, or more precisely the Department of Field Support which handles staffing matters, arranged to shift an Uzbek national with a temporary and expiring contract, Sevil Dursunovna Alirzayeva, into Goddard's position. Inner City Press' phone message to Ms. Alirzayeva voicemail on Wednesday afternoon was not returned as of deadline. Ms. Alirzayeva is listed as having an "appointment limited to service with specific Secretariat entities." The shift to the UN Pension Fund benefits her and DPKO, in exchange for which, Chad is presented with the complaint-plagued Peter Goddard. Ms. Alirzayeva has less experience than required by the vacancy announcement, but the appointment has escaped review by UN Controller Warren Sach due to the exemption of the Pension Fund from UN staff rules under a ruling of the Office of Human Resources Management's then-chief Jan Beagle.

Insiders say the deal was arranged between DFS including Jane Holl Lute and the Pension Fund's chief of operations Dulcie Bull, who as previously reported was named as a person as to whom Cocheme should take action, in Ms. Ahlenius' investigative report on the Pension Fund. Click here for more on that story. Mr. Goddard handled the financial aspects of the contract-steering detailed in Ms. Ahlenius' report. "What goes around, comes around," the well-placed source mused about the deal. "The one who will lose are in Chad."

Goddard is not only the target, but also the originator, of complaints. He too wrote to Alicia Barcena and to the UN Ethics Office, accusing the Staff Union of tape recording him and attaching a letter which argues, in light of previous reporting on the Pension Fund, that "resorting to the press is unethical." But if Pension Fund senior management does nothing, and now Secretariat officials are on the brink of passing the problem over to Chad, the press may take on the aspect of the last resort. Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/dfs2unjspf010908.html