Haiti
Cholera
Dismissal
Harms UN's
"Corporate
Reputation,”
Ging Tells
ICP
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
February 26 –
Five days
after the UN
tersely dismissed
the
pending legal
claim that it
introduced
cholera into
Haiti,
Inner City
Press asked
the director
of operation
of the UN
Office for the
Coordination
of
Humanitarian
Affair John
Ging if the
dismissal
impacted the
UN's
credibility,
even in aid
delivery. Video
here, from
Minute 34:32.
Ging
acknowledged
that it did.
After
answering
another Inner
City Press
questions
about Sudan,
he said of the
Haiti
dismissal, “of
course
those of us
working for
the UN feel
the impact of
the debate...
it affects our
corporate
reputation, of
course.” Video
here, from
Minute 37:54.
As
the UN has
refused to
provide the
legal
reasoning for
its dismissal,
and brags
instead about
new missions
it plans in
Mali, new
brigades in
Eastern Congo,
this impact
seems not to
have been
taken into
account.
Nor
has the
Department of
Peacekeeping
Operations
under Herve
Ladsous
been willing
to answer
Inner City
Press' simple
question of
what
safeguards if
any have been
implemented to
avoid the UN
spreading
cholera
elsewhere.
Ladsous
at
first outright
refused to
response to
the Inner City
Press
question, then
after
complaints by
the Free
UN Coalition
for Access,
he responded
but did not
answer. He
described UN
programs on
clean
water, after
the fact, but
nothing about
DPKO-wide
safeguards.
Ging
said that “no
OCHA
colleagues
have had
cholera, in
Haiti.” That
is clearly not
true of the
peacekeepers
under Herve
Ladsous'
command.
But what has
he done about
it? Watch this
site.
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