http://ki-media.blogspot.com/2007/10/smiling-past-corruption-sr-world-bank.html
Hello, this is Jim Adams at the World Bank and I'd like to follow up on the article from the Wall Street Journal that you reproduce in this page.
The Bank feels that the Journal left out many details regarding what happened after the investigation of those projects, and we have sent a letter to the editor where we make some clarifications. The letter will likely be posted on www.wsj.com soon, but since you're discussing this matter, I thought I'd advance the main points of the letter:
Corruption is a sad reality in many countries --as some other posters in this blog have said-- and very difficult to address. I think it is the Bank's duty to try to remedy it to the extent that it can, not to pack up and leave the country when we see signs or evidence of it. That's what we set out to do in this case.
Best,
Jim Adams
Vice President, East Asia & Pacific Region
The World Bank
The Bank feels that the Journal left out many details regarding what happened after the investigation of those projects, and we have sent a letter to the editor where we make some clarifications. The letter will likely be posted on www.wsj.com soon, but since you're discussing this matter, I thought I'd advance the main points of the letter:
- The Bank didn't ignore those cases of corruption, it was in fact Bank staff who first raised concerns about them.
- After investigations were made, the Bank suspended the Government's access to funds for those three projects.
- The Government then agreed to new anti-corruption measures for each project and to hiring an international agent (now selected) who would manage the award of contracts for Bank-funded projects.
- Only after the Government completed the anti-corruption measures and moved ahead on hiring the agent did the Bank lift the suspension on the affected projects.
- The Bank cancelled over US$2.5 million in project funding and the Government subsequently repaid the World Bank US$2.89 million.
- The Cambodian Government agreed to incorporate anti-corruption action plans into all existing and future Bank legal agreements.
- The Bank is in the process of suspending (debarring) the firms involved in the projects where corruption was detected.
Corruption is a sad reality in many countries --as some other posters in this blog have said-- and very difficult to address. I think it is the Bank's duty to try to remedy it to the extent that it can, not to pack up and leave the country when we see signs or evidence of it. That's what we set out to do in this case.
Best,
Jim Adams
Vice President, East Asia & Pacific Region
The World Bank
10 comments:
"Corruption is a sad reality in many countries --as some other posters in this blog have said-- and very difficult to address"
It is even more difficult to address the problems when there is not even a law established to deal with corruption. "Measures," "plans", "agreed to...," all these words mean perpetual ambiguity and non-accountability. So, the question here is when the Bank will start to require more cocrete actions instead of promises?
It doesn't really matter what the World Bank said because if the World Bank make mistake and dirt poor Cambodian people will pay for it anyway and this is the fact of life! This is only the beginning and more to come!
The "World Bank",It meant "Very Poor Management".
Jim Adams said, among other things, that "the Government subsequently repaid the World Bank US$2.89 million."
Has he ever wondered where that repayment had come from, and whether the Cambodian government had taken any action against the concerned corrupt officials to get that money back, for instance by seizing their properties and auctioning them off?
Or does he think that this is not the World Bank's business?
How fortunate those corrupt officials were to have the government, that is, the Cambodian taxpayers, to repay the World Bank for them!
What a reward for them!
LAO Mong Hay, Hong Kong
Like hun sen said, foreingers are there in Cambodia for a long vacation with pay and I think World Bank employees in Cambodia are among the vacationers. If they truely care about the people, thing would be different by now.
I told you several times that this is the game the World Bank plays. How many times do I need to tell you, huh?
Angel
Doomed if you do, doomed if you dont. What should the World Bank do then? not deal with Cambodia and corrupt governments at all?
Hey, let's not blow peanut money out of proportion here. 3 millions USD out of about 1 billions USD tax revenue is not so bad for a troubling country like Cambodia. Moreover, it was not a complete lost either; many khmers people had received jobs to relieve their hardship from it, alright?
Peanut money! Peanut money! You called US$2.89 million which AH HUN SEN Vietcong slave took from dirt poor Cambodian people to pay back the World Bank for his corruption as peanut money?
Oh well! I didn't know that you are that rich and how about you give US$2.89 back to dirt poor Cambodian people and do you have the money? If you don't have the damn money and just shut the fuck up!
No one took the 3 millions, idiot. The bank just didn't like who it was contracted to. And many workers got paid from the contract, alright?
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