http://www.asisonline.org/certification/newsletter0807.docCOMMENT #1:
How old can Carla be if she has 30 yrs of experience? I thought there are only 192 representative member countries.
I believe that OHRM is a joke also.Where is the transparency and good governance? At least in the private sector if the "fils a papa" who got hired w/o talent screwed up , he at least gets the axe but when " have been" politicians are the decision makers, welcome to the abyss.
COMMENT #2:
How can she be responsible of 200 countries, what are all the rest of UNDP Security Unit doing ? What is Jab and others doing? This is amazing. Keep it up UNDP Watch, staff need to know all and judge now that we're finalizing the evaluation for our managers.
COMMENT #3:
the Administrator should review the internal capacities of UNDP Security Unit to prevent such events from happening again. We need former or current military officials from/with a national or multinational force background, with direct hands-on experience in policing or Interpol or any other national or inter-regional counter-terrorism bodies. If UNDP allows that we are "secured" from these dilettantes, we might face even worst. So is now or never time to change and take some responsibilities and ensure that all our colleagues worldwide are security compliant. I have been a ResRep, and personally think that UNDP today has not yet done a real on-the-ground assessment of the security situation in each country. Because we are afraid to "disturb" our host governments, if our assessment comes too critical.
It's Administrator's responsibility to call upon all DOs demanding an update of all Country Security Plans and internal-security situation in countries where we operate. We should work now to prevent what happen in Algeria. I also think that UN-DSS is nonexistent and should carry much more responsibility on proactive-security and proactive-assessment of our country offices. UNDP is ultimately the UN presence in that country, therefore Administrator should demand more attention from UN Secretariat, as well as more decentralization of decision making and resources directly from DSS. If UN has a DSS - why we need at all a UNDP Security Unit. Let's consolidate all resources, knowledge and efforts in one place. Is the only way to avoid future disasters.
COMMENT #4:
Corruption in UNDP is endemic. This rolling of heads would be great news, but for UNDP to reinvent itself for the 21st century, a stringent performance management system needs to be implemented in letter and spirit. There are many people enjoying the perks and privileges of UN employment with none of the accountability and focus on results.
1 comment:
Nietzsche said “The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it with deliberately faulty argument” had Nietzsche worked at UNDP he may have restated this to say “The most perfidious way of harming UNDP consists of protecting it with deliberate indifference to competencies”, as my colleagues have indicated in the previous post and responses this could not be more clear than exemplified by Mr. Terblanche and Mr. Swart and their blatant muck up of the security unit.
It is high time that those (South Africans) placed by Mssrs. Terblanche and Swart budge up and make room for those who have the competencies or wait until they are sacked which will be the inevitable result of any investigation that may result due to the claims on UNDP Watch.
I do not speak from a position of ignorance on this issue as I was around in the former Office of Administrative Services while the South African security empire was built. Truly the administrative staffers as well as managers in OAS know that the vast majority of the previous UNDP watch entries on this topic are in fact true.
The fact is that the culture that pervaded OAS at the time may have contributed to what is best described as a situation as bent as a nine bob note. The staffing of a majority of professional posts by a single nationality that most certainly have tangible personal connections is too simply crooked.
I have but a few comments that I hope UNDP watch will agree to post.
COMMENT 1
Mr. Swart should take heed – “By a title is not a manager made”!!!
Mr. Swart would have done well by following the example his friend Mr. Terblanche set. When you seek advancement you should be sure to have the competencies. This well and truly differs from the qualifications for the post which both Mr. Terblanche and Mr. Swart may well have in hand. A programme specialist in demining is hardly a solid substitute for a real security officer and Mr. Swart should have know that by accepting the post he was placing his career and integrity at risk.
Mr. Terblanche should have realized by bring in his friend and installing him as the deputy chief without using the appropriate HR mechanisms to create the post he was placing his own career and integrity at risk.
Mr. Terblanche exemplified this idiocy when he himself attempted to write his own job description as he maneuvered to change his post from a P5 to D1.
In staff meetings at OAS this was common talk before and after the meetings, while the majority of the staffers in OAS were in fact engaged in the gross realignment process that was underway at the time to accommodate the failed service centre concept. The rumor (I say rumor because I did not personally witness the document) that Mr. Terblanche went so far as to add previous military experience at the rank of (whatever rank Mr. Terblanche held in the South African Defense Forces) in lieu of security experience caused much consternation amongst those of us who were faced with loss of or posts while we held the necessary competencies for our posts.
Mr. Swart himself mentioned openly one morning before one of or OAS meetings that Mr. Terblanche asked him to similarly draft his own job description for the deputy chief post at P5 not as yet not officially sanctioned or approved by OHRM and OPB.
Too wisely Mr. Swart let Mr. Terblanche swim the waters of a post realignment exercise first before entering into one of his own.
Mr. Terblanche made no secret of his disdain for the members of the security unit who applied for the chief of security post when the D1realignment was approved. When he himself was not selected and he realized that there was no future for him in UNDP security unit as the chief - he quickly announced to all that Mr. Swart would be serving as the acting chief of the security unit while he began his search for a new post. Here perhaps is where the real intrigue starts.
As a P5 manager with experience in demining why did Mr. Terbanche seek instead to remain active in the security field. Certainly amongst the any UNDP DDR projects there would be place for him. Was a secondment to UNOPS and a return to demining now off the chart of potentials? Why was he not retained elsewhere in UNDP?
The answer is clear. Mr. Terblanche simply did not have the competencies to be retained as a manger in an organization newly committed to reform and transparency.
Behind the locked doors of his office Mr. Terblanche began his quest to find his new professional home only it seemed that all the doors were closed to him.
Openly he discussed his fustrations in OAS staff meetings. "I have been fired!" he would say. "I must only concern myself with finding a job". You often reap what you sow. I can say without error that all in OAS could sense the tension, fustrataion and anger from Mr. Terblanche. And it was just as obvious that the medium for his to vent was to be his own unit, how we all pitied them.
Only in final desperation did he receive an offer from DSS to become the new FSCO for Serbia although he had to agree to a demotion to P4.
Mr. Swart it cannot be clear enough. You have been found out Sir! And you should consider the future should you continue with your masquerade. Mr. Terblanche gave you a title even if fictitious, unsanctioned and created against OHRM rules and regulations but it does not in any estimation make you a security manager. Will you allow yourself to fall unto the same self-made trap?
COMMENT 2
For the other South Africans put into post by Mr. Terblanche and Mr. Swart, will your qualification stand to the inevitable review that will eventually occur? Did Mr. Terblanche and Mr. Swart ask for and receive waivers for any educational or experiential lapses? Did they undertake special actions as are alleged to ensure that you got a better contract than those with true competencies? Was the selection process linked to your post transparent and fully supported and approved by OHRM? Do the allegations of prior friendship, working relationship or other links have any validity?
Yes, you may have the qualifications, and the waivers may have been quite properly sought and dutifully approved, the selection process may have been fully transparent and even attended by OHRM, and your professional linkages and friendships may never be fully realized and any interference on your behalf by others may never be discovered, but is this likely?
“The perfect bureaucrat everywhere is the man who manages to make no decisions and escape all responsibility”.
Were the right decisions made in selection? Were scores ever changed or overidden - by whom? Were you provided "assistance" by anyone to respond to the queries of the interview panel as some in OHRM have commented such? Are you sure that under the pressure of the Executive Office or external review that those who placed you will not try and escape their responsibility?
Mr. Terblanche and Mr. Swart are by now almost certainly practised bureaucrats having mastered the language of security and the details of pretending to be expert when they are in fact not.
Will your friends, these bureaucrats, make decisions to save themselves over you and escape their personal and professional responsibilities or will they try and refocus the queries on you?
COMMENT 3
Having been in OAS I know many of the staffers in the UNDP security unit and most of those I have met have been excellent and professional in their duties and always willing to help.
Under new leadership, now removed from OAS and placed in BOM and with the tragedy of Algeria now fixated and an inquiry soon to be underway, UNDP can resurrect from the ashes and blood of Algiers an effective security unit. Was the money sent elsewhere that could have lessen the tragedy as alledged? Who Mr. Swart was ultimately responsible for managing what may later be revealed as blood money, to be spent elsewhere?
Will UNDP's most senior managers now move swiftly to correct the injustices of the past or will they bugger about and wait for the next tragedy to unfold? If they do not what might be thier legacy?
A CLOSING REMARK
It has been said “Believe nothing against another and never that which may hurt another unless it be a greater hurt to some other to conceal it.” Hearty thanks are owed to all those at UNDP Watch for giving a voice to those who chose not to conceal their frustration and the corruption in UNDP.
"The devil is too oft in the detail", open all the books, fix the blame and let us all see the details!!!
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