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UN's Solution of Herfkens
at $1 a Year Could Cost $100,000 in "Subsistence Allowance," Tudor
Hotel Games
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED
NATIONS, September 2, updated Sept. 3
--
Eveline Herfkens, who wrongfully
took $280,000 from the Dutch government for
luxury housing while ostensibly working for the UN's anti-poverty
Millennium
Campaign, announced last Friday that rather than return any of the
money, she
will work for the UN for one dollar for a year. While to many her
refusal to
return the money is scandalous, particularly when compared to the UN's
decision
to prosecute a lower-income mother in Brooklyn who erroneously received
money
from the UN, even her penance is not what it appears.
Tuesday at the UN, Inner City Press asked Ban
Ki-moon's Deputy Spokesperson Marie Okabe about Ms. Herfkens "dollar a
year" position, whether it was appropriate and what work she will do. Video here,
from Minute 18:39.
Ms. Okabe referred the question to
the UN
Development Program, whose spokesman Stephane Dujarric Inner City Press
asked
to "please state what work Eveline Herfkens will be doing for
UNDP,
whether it is full-time, and what benefits beyond the stated one dollar
a year
she will receive."
Eveline Herfkens makes a point -- about
corruption?
Late on Tuesday, Dujarric responded with a statement
that
"UNDP
management is pleased to announce that it has accepted an offer from
Eveline
Herfkens to work as a Special Advisor for the Millennium Campaign. Ms.
Herfkens
will work as a consultant on a $1 per year salary basis as of early
September
for a 12 month period."
Regarding
benefits, he told
Inner City Press that "as with any other staff member, she will
receive DSA when on official business." DSA stands for Daily
Subsistence
Allowance, which for the UN in New York is fully $378 a day, $620 a day
if the
staff member stays in for example the nearby Tudor Hotel. Click here for UN's
DSA schedule, ST/IC/2008/44, which Inner City Press
is putting online.
At this most expensive rate, to which Ms. Herfkens
has shown she feels
entitled, her "dollar a year" could cost the UN $133,680.
At the cheapest rate, she would cost the UN
$57,450. Some penance.
Analysis: the UN's murky disclosure
of how and how much its officials are paid would never be accepted
under Security and Exchange Commission or other applicable rules.
Salaries are under-reported, without including so-called "Post
Adjustment" or DSA. Recently, UNDP told Inner City Press that how much
it insures its officials for, and if families of victims of the
December 2007 bombing of the UN in Algiers have been paid, "is a
confidential matter for each person." Then UNDP discloses, in response
to a question, that Herfkens' supposed dollar a year in fact includes
DSA. We will continue to ask how much and when she is paid, given the
claim that her arrangement somehow makes up for her wrongful receipt of
$280,000 from a government while supposedly working only for the UN.
Footnote: speaking of
the Tudor
Hotel, several Inner City Press sources have noticed another UN
Assistant
Secretary General, Jane Holl Lute, going in and out of the location, on
42nd
Street east of Second Avenue. These sources wonder if she, or other
long-time full-time
UN officials, still live in hotels and collect the UN's generous Daily
Subsistence Allowance. Given the difficulty
of getting any answers from Jane
Holl Lute about her documented involvement in steering a $250 million
no-bid
contract to Lockheed Martin for Darfur peacekeeping camps, it has
not yet been
feasible to get this question answered. But we will get to the bottom
of the use
and misuse of the UN's DSA.
Update of September 3
-- Jane Holl Lute's previous spokesman in her previous Peacekeeping job
has written to state that she does not live in the Tudor Hotel, and to
state that it was not difficult to get answers from her about the
Lockheed Martin / PAE contract. On the first, duly noted. On the
latter, we'll let the record,
including before the General Assembly's Fifth Committee, speak for
itself. The spokesman, still apparently answering for Jane Holl
Lute, has been asked a number of other questions, responses to which
will be reported on this site.
Watch
this
site. And this (on
South Ossetia),
this, on
Russia-Georgia,
and
this --
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