At
UN, Ban Wants
Budget
Advisory Panel
Views Ignored,
Members
Push Back
By
Matthew
Russell Lee,
Exclusive
UNITED
NATIONS,
November 27, updated
-- In a letter
to the
chairman of
the UN's
budget
committee on
November 26,
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon urged
the committee
to ignore the
recommendations
of its own
Advisory
Committee on
Administrative
and Budgetary
Questions.
Ban wants to
push through
his so-called
Mobility plan
while
questions
remain
outstanding.
The
two page
letter,
addressed to
the this
year's
chairman, the
Deputy
Permanent
Representative
of Germany Miguel
Berger, is not
yet public,
members say,
but Inner City
Press
has it.
As
one well
placed member
of the Budget
Committee
exclusively
told Inner
City Press,
Ban's
"mobility is
now 'key' to a
bunch of
projects
that began
before it,
like the
Global Field
Support
Strategy and
UMOJA," mired
in delays and
nepotism.
Ban's letter
"stress[es]
that the new
mobility
framework is
at the heart
of our key
management
initiatives
and a key
enabler for
other on-going
reform
efforts, such
as UMOJA, our
enterprise
resource
planning
system and the
Global Field
Support
Strategy."
Ban
writes that he
is
"disappointed"
with the
timelines
recommended by
the ACABQ, elections
and then
election of
the chair of
which Inner
City Press
recently
covered. (On
Monday, voting
for vice
chairman
between the
candidates of
Gabon and the
UK was
postponed,
with some idea
there might be
two co-vice
chairs.)
What ACABQ
recommended on
Ban's
"mobility"
proposal
is
a one year
delay in order
to answer
questions, get
more
information
-- as one
member put it,
for more
"transparency
and
accountability."
Ban's letter
states that he
is
"disappointed
with the
timeline
suggested by
the Advisory
Committee on
Administrative
and Budgetary
Questions
which cannot
meet our
requirements."
The
letter came on
the eve of an emergency
staff meeting
about
"offshoring
and
outsourcing"
the staff say
Ban is trying
to
implement.
Reform
of the UN is
needed -- see
for example
the inaction
of UN
Peacekeepers
as the M23
mutineers took
over Goma in
the Democratic
Republic of
the Congo, and
the UN's
continued
inaction on a
claim
that its
peacekeepers
introduced
cholera to
Haiti, while
it talks
about
accountability
and the rule
of law.
But
going against
the
recommendations
of the UN's
own Advisory
Committee
on
Administrative
and Budgetary
Questions may
not be the
right road
to reform,
several budget
committee
experts and
member states
have
opined.
Some see it as
similar to the
stealthly
floated
proposal for
the UN to use
drones.
Ban's chief of
peacekeeping
Herve Ladsous
proposed it to
the C-34 in
March, after
which several
members
complained to
Inner City
Press. They
said the
proposal would
only serve,
and be used
by, a small
number of
powerful
states -- like
this newer
proposal?
Now, using the
UN's failure
in the DRC as
a pretext, the
proposal
has
re-appeared.
Ladsous has refused
to answer any
Press
questions.
On November
26, several
members of the
General
Assembly and
Security
Council panned
Ladsous and
his plan. But
will Ban just
try to push it
through,
Mobility
style? Watch
this site.
Watch
this site.
, 
