|
|||||
UN Performance Problems UN Management Accountability Struggles Where is the Rule of Law? Inadequate UN Oversight Recent Developments
|
|
In
mid-May 2005 the UN Secretariat leadership announced a rather dramatic set
of UN reforms that were to proceed at full speed to counteract the
negative management events of late 2004 and early 2005: "Deputy Secretary-General
Louise Fréchette today unveiled a series of reforms taken by the United
Nations in response to criticisms of UN management from entities appointed
by Secretary-General Kofi Annan and from the world body's own
staff. 'Unprecedented challenges'
faced by the UN have shown that the world body must immediately
reform' … [according to] background
information distributed prior to a press briefing by Ms.
Frechette. Noting that reform has been on
the UN agenda since 1997, it said, 'The UN must take real action now,
where it is in the Secretary-General's authority to do so directly, particularly in the critical areas
of management, oversight and accountability'
… The major criticisms have come
from the … [Volcker group examining the 'Perhaps the most obvious
shortcomings identified by the Volcker Inquiry and other crises are in the
area of oversight and accountability. The current 'control' systems for
monitoring management performance and preventing fraud and corruption are
insufficient and must be significantly enhanced', she
said." "Fréchette unveils UN reforms responding to Volcker
panel's criticisms", UN News Service,
The new reforms were
contained in a "UN Management Reforms: 2005" document, which listed
actions, current status, and time frames for activities underway to
improve senior management performance, enhance oversight and
accountability, ensure ethical conduct, and increase
transparency. "UN management reforms 2005: Management reform
measures to strengthen accountability, ethical conduct and management
performance",
The "2005" document
seems at first glance to deal firmly with almost all the grave management
accountability and rule-of-law defects that IO Watch discusses throughout
this archive. Unfortunately,
not only past history, but a closer examination suggest that much or most
of this Secretariat initiative is actually just more of the UN old boys'
"smoke and mirrors" games discussed throughout this archive. To note only
a few grave flaws: 1. It refers only to
reform "on the agenda" since 1997 (and not its weak outcomes), omitting
the equally dynamic (but failed) management reforms of 1986 and
1993-1994. 2. On the key issue of
senior management performance, Ms. Frechette chose to highlight the lesser
issue of induction briefing and training for new senior officials, raising
the blunt question: why did no one ever think of this
before? 3. The reform report
does discuss enhancing accountability and oversight of those managers, but
this is to be done by "rigorous monitoring" by yet another in a long line
of senior management committees, meeting occasionally and advising the
Secretary-General, i.e., UN "old boy" self-regulation will continue on as
before. 4. The reform programme replaces the
earlier, arrogant, Secretariat dismissal of the UN Board of Auditors'
mid-2004 recommendation for a strong UN anti-fraud programme with sudden
new determination to establish "a comprehensive anti-fraud and corruption
policy". However, this sounds very much like more of the
age-old grand UN talk, but no real implementation actions (or leadership
commitment, or additional resources) to prevent any repetition of
oil-for-food or similar recent mismanagement problems (see A real UN fraud prevention
programme.) 5. The reform document says not one
word about the grave UN administration of justice problems which are of
much concern to the General Assembly, i.e., the absence of the rule of law
in the UN Secretariat which allows UN managers to act and rule with
impunity (see Inept "Administration of Justice"
System.) The timing of this
Secretariat reform announcement, much of which was still "in process" in
May 2005, is also interesting.
It appeared just before an excellent and detailed new report
on UN reform was issued by a
bipartisan group mandated by the U.S. Congress. Their document of some 150
pages contains a very informative, critical, and constructive chapter on
urgent management reform needs.
Its very first footnote cites the May "UN Management Reform: 2005"
document, which, they state, "claims" that many such changes are now
underway. American interests and UN reform: Report of the
Task Force on the United Nations,
United States Institute of Peace, June 2005, especially Chapter 3,
"In need of repair: Reforming the United Nations", available on the
Institute's website at www.usip.org/ under "Task force on UN".
The substantive
"Today
I shall be presenting my
report, "In Larger Freedom" to the United Nations General
Assembly. … I
wanted to remind the governments of the world, who put me in my job and to
whom I am accountable,
that they are in the UN to represent not themselves but their peoples, who
expect them to work for the [UN Charter's] … aims … The
UN … can be a much more effective instrument if its governing body, the General
Assembly, is better organized and gives clearer directives to
us in the secretariat, with the flexibility to carry them out, and holds us clearly accountable for
how we do it. … ...
If world leaders rise to their
responsibilities, the
rebirth and renewal of the UN will be just
beginning - and with it, renewed hope for a freer, fairer, and
safer world."
Kofi Annan, "An
aspiration to a larger freedom", Financial Times
( "C. The
Secretariat 184.
A capable and effective Secretariat is indispensable to the work of the
United Nations.
… 186.
… The Secretary-General and his or her managers must be given the
discretion, the means, the authority and the expert assistance that they
need to manage [the] organization … Similarly, Member States must have the
oversight tools they need to hold the Secretary-General truly accountable
for his/her strategy and leadership. 191. … I ask Member States to work with
me to undertake a comprehensive review of the
budget and human resources rules under which we
operate. 192. … We must continue to improve the
transparency and accountability of the Secretariat.
…" "In larger freedom:
towards development, security and human rights for all: Report of the
Secretary-General", UN document A/59/2005 of [emphasis added]
As best IO Watch can
determine, however, only the This conspicuous
silence on critical governance and oversight issues among the 190-plus UN
member states is a very serious failure by their diplomatic missions,
foreign ministries, and legislatures. At the very least, the 14 "Geneva
Group" countries -- democratic Member States who pay some three-quarters
of the $10 billion or so that the UN spends every year -- should
collectively or individually be proposing very serious analyses and
concrete action commitments to firmly oversee and improve UN operations.
This damaging inertia is discussed in the concluding "Answers" subsection
of this archive, under Geneva Group "due diligence"
failure. IO Watch will
continue, in this subsection on the old boys' last hurrah, to track the
evolution of this 2005 UN Secretariat management reform initiative --
which is the actually the fifth of a series in the last twenty years
(1986, 1993-1994, 1997 and 2002).
All of them essentially failed, as shown by the May 2005
Secretariat admission of "crises
… in the areas of oversight and
accountability." However, IO Watch also
provides in the rest of this archive much more detailed analysis of the
factors which have led to this crisis situation. They are: 1. The standoff, and resulting
perpetuation of mismanagement, created by the General Assembly's
steady demands since 1993 for implementation of fundamental management
accountability and oversight reforms versus Mr. Annan's consistent
counter-actions to "free the UN managers" to manage aggressively, along
with the Secretariat's non-implementation (and actual firm suppression) of
required UN whistle-blowing processes, as discussed in the remaining
subsections of this section on UN Management Accountability
Struggles; 2. The decision by the
General Assembly in 2005, over Secretariat objections, to seek a new model
for the Secretariat's inept administration of justice system, which --
behind the scenes -- provides seriously flawed "justice" and feeble staff
rights, while preserving Secretariat management impunity: a much-needed
revision of the UN's clumsy "telephone book" of staff conduct could help
greatly to reverse this, as could an external expert review of the
internal justice system (if properly done),and establishment of a strong
(not a token as at present) human rights ombudsman, as discussed under the
section on Where is the Rule of
Law?; 3. The very belated recognition by
all concerned that the Secretariat's human resources office (OHRM) and its
internal oversight body (the OIOS) do not presently have the resources,
systems, or the "backbone" required to properly monitor management
accountability and enforce appropriate sanctions, in the section on Inadequate UN
Oversight; 4. The Secretariat's weak overall
accountability culture and other major current UN mismanagement issues
which have come to light, not just the Iraq oil-for-food programme and
various anti-corruption weaknesses; but first and foremost contamination
of the new OIOS investigation process in recent years by amateur UN
manager/investigators and the active suppression of UN whistle-blowers
(who, if they had been encouraged a decade ago as planned, could have
greatly mitigated the oil-for-food scandals and much else, as discussed in
the subsections on The UN, Alone and
UNaccountable and Other Major Problems
under Recent Developments;
and finally, 5. True reform actions needed to
implement a real UN fraud prevention programme, at last ensure merit in UN
personnel management, develop a coherent UN strategy, and, most important
of all, engage UN Member States in firm, substantive, professional, and
continuous oversight to hold the Secretary-General and his managers
accountable for their performance (as Mr. Annan has now (vaguely)
proposed, but which no one (except for the single US review of June 2005)
has yet examined, as discussed under Answers: A Starting
Point at the end of this archive's
Recent Developments
section.)
|
|||
