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

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis

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."

            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.

Locals await UN / Goddard arrival?

            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.

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These reports are also available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis.

Click here for a Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click here for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an undefined trust fund.  Video Analysis here

  Because a number of Inner City Press' UN sources go out of their way to express commitment to serving the poor, and while it should be unnecessary, Inner City Press is compelled to conclude this installment in a necessarily-ongoing series by saluting the stated goals of the UN agencies and many of their staff. Keep those cards, letters and emails coming, and phone calls too, we apologize for any phone tag, but please continue trying, and keep the information flowing.

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Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.

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