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At UNDP, Ad Melkert Surfaces in
Race for Top Post, Opposes Disclosure, Like Mattsson Retaliates
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED
NATIONS, January 29 -- As
competition for the top spot at the UN Development Program heats up,
the
agency's embattled Deputy Administrator Ad Melkert has publicly thrown
his name
into contention. The nomination will
ultimately be made by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who loudly
urged all of
his senior officials to make public financial disclosure, so that
conflicts of
interest could be identified.
Melkert, when asked for his views by Inner City
Press in 2007, openly disagreed with Ban's call for transparency. "No,
I'm not in favor of financial disclosure put online," Mr. Melkert said.
That "oversteps the privacy of people.. no one is served by having it
online." Video here,
from Minute 37:55 through 44:41.
Such an approach, UNDP insiders say, would ill-serve
the agency at this
time. It remains unclear, including thanks to flip-flopping by
Melkert, whether even audits of UNDP's work can be released to
the public by the member states which pay for the work. To have the
agency led
by an official who himself refuses to make the most minimal public
disclosure would
surely be a step backward, as would rewarding and promoting an official
so
closely identified with retaliation against whistleblowers within UNDP.
He once said,
"You ain't seen nothing yet," and that remains the case.
Ad Melkert, under sign, the campaigning
without financial disclosure begin?
The Dutch press says that the U.S. and Norway are
also interested in the
post. They miss, then, the word on the UN street of a possible switch
of Ban's Indian
chief of staff Vijay Nambiar to the UNDP, and interest of Jan Mattsson,
the
Swedish head of the UN Office of Project Services.
A recent UNOPS financial statement trashed those
staff members who have
dared complain of how they were treated, click here
for that. Dutch and Swedish retaliators, then,
are among those in the race to head up UNDP. Inner City Press has asked
Ban's
spokesperson's office if the short list will be public, as it was under
Kofi
Annan. There has been no answer.
Click here for Inner City Press' Jan.
16, 2009 debate about Gaza
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
Click here for Inner City
Press Nov. 7 debate on the war in Congo
Watch this site, and this Oct. 2 debate, on
UN, bailout, MDGs
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
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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
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