CORIMEC Scandal: It was not a "judgement call"

Last week, Kemal Dervis said in his press conference that:- "My judgment call would probably have been different," adding that he could see both side.

But today, thanks to UNDP Watchers inside the Bureau of Management (BOM), we could confirm that it wasn't a "judgement call" as described from the UNDP's boss. It was rather a direct call from Akiko Yuge, the Assistant Secretary General and Director of Bureau of Management of UNDP, who gave the order to Krishan Batra to go ahead and enter into contract with CORIMEC, despite the rejection of the ACP.

As UNDP Watch already published last week, the ACP in New York had REJECTED the case on the grounds that CORIMEC was no longer on the good-standing list of United Nations Vendors and that the company was "blacklisted" from UNPS just a month before the UNDP Pakistan brought the contract for approval. . Since in this case the supplier was involved in bribing and that was a very serious matter, the ACP members unanimously did not support this contract.

Here is the email of Akiko Yuge:

In absence of signed minutes of ACPs, Krishan Batra decided to over-pass the authority of the ACP, and decided to approve the contract on an "exceptional basis" as per Akiko's email.

Despite numerous statements from Krishan Batra to assure the 21st floor that "ACP did in fact approved the contract" and that "even Samaras was OK with it" - sources inside the office of Kemal Dervis, confirmed that Administrator is unhappy with the performance of the Procurement Unit of UNDP, and is keeping all options on the table.

A UNDP Watcher inside the 21st floor, said that on a first review of the facts, the Office of Administrator has already established that ACP has acted against all rules and without due diligence and that Batra's practices in conducting ACP meetings without signed minutes from members have cretated a dangerous precendent for UNDP, in face of upcomming Executive Board Meetings and its pledge for transparency.

A member of ACP, said for UNDP-WATCH: "it is ridiculous to see the level of capacity of those represented in ACP. Before Batra, ACP was made of top representatives from each Regional Bureau, at D1 and above. Everytime there was some important submission, if CO wasn't able to come to NY we would have the Desk-Officer for that Country in NY present the submission. Krishan Batra has deliberately lowered the capacity of ACP to the level of assistants and SSAs, in order to rule and swing ACP whichever way he or his supervisors wanted to. In my opinion ACP should return to its previous composition, where Programme Managers (D1 and above) take the leadership and where Procurement Unit plays only advisory role. Under Krishan we are currently in a major conflict of interest."