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In Darfur, No-Bid Contract Problem Ripens, UN Ambassadors Jockey for Position, Children Wave

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press in Africa: News Analysis

DARFUR, June 5 -- As the members of the Security Council flew Thursday to Darfur, a long-simmering scandal of the UN's $250 million no-bid contract with Lockheed Martin's PA&E subsidiary came to the fore. The head of the UN Mission in Darfur, Rodolphe Adada, told Inner City Press that while Sudan has stayed firm that Lockheed cannot get any more extensions of its no-bid contract, the issue was discussed between Sudan and U.S. Envoy Richard Williamson before he stormed out of Khartoum earlier this week, saying he was "sad and disappointed." Sources indicate this concerned the Lockheed Martin contract in Darfur and not only the growing tension in Abyea in the south. In the airport terminal before the flight to Darfur, Sudan's Ambassador to the UN Abdalmahmoud Abdalhaleem Mohamed said while his country had granted the UN's plea for a three month extension for Lockheed Martin through July, that will be "final... no more visas will be given."

  On the airport tarmac in El Fasher, as Inner City Press photographed the ritual handshakes between UN Ambassadors and local dignitaries dressed in bright white robes, a Sudanese military handler grabbed at the camera. He pointed behind the photo-op at two helicopter gunships marked with the Sudanese flag. "You do not make photograph of that," he said, indicating that he wanted to see the camera's monitor. An apology was given, and the slow drive over sand roads to the UNAMID base began, led by a mixture of Sudanese military and UN-African Union peacekeeping troops, some bearing the acronym AMIS.

  South African Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo, when told that the delegate would only visit a single internally-displaced persons camp and that only for an hour asked, "What are we, tourists?" By the time the Ambassadors reached the UNAMID camp -- which does have a large PA&E sign outside -- the program had been modified, to confine the UNAMID briefings to a minimum and allow more time in the field, with the Wali of North Darfur put to the end of the Council's program, "when we will know what we've seen," Amb. Kumalo said.

Amb.'s of South Africa and UK, during their leg

   SRSG Adada, asked if he thinks that Sudanese government wants peace in Darfur, said "we have to assume so, no? It is not simple for any country to accept foreigners with arms in their country. If they do they must want peace." Inner City Press asked about the issue of the child soldiers that Sudan says it captured during the Justice and Equality Movement assault on Omduran. Adada said the child soldiers exist, there are 89 of them, and that UNICEF has visited them. On Wednesday, UK Ambassador John Sawers had said the UN has no proof about the child soldiers. Perhaps Adada will share these facts with him on Thursday.  The question remains of what the UN will do about the issue.

  As the plane descended toward El Fasher, Amb. Sawers took some questions from the press. Inner City Press asked him about the Lockheed Martin contract, without a real response, and told him about the Aegis Trust film, put online this week, of Darfur witnesses against Ahmad Harun and Ali Kushayb. Amb. Sawers agreed, pretty damning. A French reporter asked him if the UK will "follow the French" and threaten sanctions on those in the Sudanese government who do not cooperate with the International Criminal Court.

  "Follow the French?" Amb. Sawers asked, clearly peeved. "I thought they were following us." The scuttlebutt is that since French Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert is said to be angling to take over from Jean-Marie Guehenno as head of UN Peacekeeping, he is positioning himself even in closed-door consultations as the man with an extra idea, an extra thing to say. On the plane, Amb. Sawers added that Ripert had only been laying out a European Union position, and that the UK has member a member of the EU for 35 years, it is not "following" France.

   As these Permanent Five bickered, children in front of mud houses waved at the passing convoy of soldiers all armed to the teeth. Welcome to Darfur. To be continued.

Full disclosure: this column was written in a windowless trailer in the UNAMID camp... courtesy of Lockheed Martin and the $250 million no-bid contract it was given.

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These reports are usually 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

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