By James Glanz
New York Times
24 June 2005
Allegations of widespread corruption have dogged the Iraqi government since the invasion in 2003, when billions of dollars for reconstruction and training began pouring into the country. Many programs had far less impact than expected, but persistent rumors that money was being siphoned by corrupt officials were largely impossible to pin down.
Now, an office originally set up by the American occupation to investigate corruption in Iraq has accumulated the first solid estimates of the problem. The results are likely to fuel the most pessimistic concerns over where the money has gone.
The abuses range from sweetheart deals on leases, to exorbitant contracts for things like garbage hauling, to payments for construction that was never done.
Since it began doing business in earnest last July, the office, now run by the Iraqi government and called the Commission on Public Integrity, has looked into more than 814 cases of potential wrongdoing, producing 399 investigations that were still open at the end of May. So far, arrest warrants have been issued for 44 Iraqi government employees.
The open cases include investigations into several ministries in the government of the former prime minister, Ayad Allawi, and warrants for two of his ministers, said Ali al-Shabot, spokesman for the commission, who provided the data during interviews this week.
The cases touch not just the executive branch but sprawl across provincial and city governments. Mr. Shabot declined to give extensive details on individual cases, citing pending litigation. But a check with some agencies that have sent complaints to the commission disclose some apparent rackets that would not surprise anyone familiar with governmental corruption in the west, especially big-city corruption.
In one case, said Mazin A. Makkia, head of the Baghdad City Council, the cost for a garbage-hauling job shot up fivefold in one year, even though the original contract was already far overpriced. In cases involving American money, Mr. Makkia said, the council is looking into what appear to be phantom rebuilding projects -- expenditures that have left a paper trail but no trace on the landscape of the city.
"It's so clear where the money goes," he said, smiling wearily.
But beyond suggesting that contractors and city officials had enriched themselves, Mr. Makkia said he would not point fingers until the investigations were completed.
The commission, formed by the former chief American administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, is legally allowed to investigate governmental corruption as far back as 1968. But many of the most prominent cases concern the Allawi government, prompting the former prime minister to claim that political bias is at work, a charge the commission stoutly denies.
"We are not targeting the ex-prime minister," Mr. Shabot said. "It's not true and it's incorrect."
Other cases reported, especially in a nation whose health-care system is stretched far beyond its limits, raise eyebrows even among the most cynical observers of official graft. In Kut, a city in the south, an official is accused of taking kickbacks in a case involving a public hospital that was improperly leased to a well-connected private cooperative for 1,000 Iraqi dinars (about 70 cents) a year, said Abdul Jaleel al-Shemari, the deputy health minister.
Yet another involves possible overpricing and incorrect technical specifications on a large shipment of ambulances from Canada, Dr. Shemari said. The two former cabinet officials in Dr. Allawi's government are also suspected of manipulating contracts of various kinds.
"They've wasted the public money," said Mr. Shabot of those officials, whom he identified as the former minister of labor, Layla Abdul Lateef, and the former minister of transportation, Louay Hatem al-Eris. "Misuse of authority," Mr. Shabot said, ticking off the charges. "Misusing their post for personal interest."
Ms. Lateef, who had to submit to a police raid on her house, declined through a relative to comment. Mr. Eris was believed to be traveling abroad and could not be reached.
The former housing minister, Omar al-Farouk al-Damluji, said in an interview that he was also the target of an investigation by the commission and he professed his innocence.
In past statements that were often little noticed at the time, the head of the commission, Radhi Hamza al-Radhi, has also hinted that Dr. Allawi's ministries of defense, interior, electricity and health may be investigated. The issue of corruption was brought to Western attention this week during an international meeting in Brussels, when Hussain al-Shahristani, the influential deputy speaker of the National Assembly, said that corruption had reached "disastrous proportions" since 2003 and that some countries had been unwilling to send financial aid as a result. Dr. Shahristani made his comments to Reuters.
Few Iraqi officials deny that corruption at some level is a fact of life in their government. Even Dr. Allawi concedes that when he was in office, he ordered corruption investigations into three of his own ministers after receiving complaints.
All three of the ministers are among those that have been mentioned as targets or potential targets of the commission, Dr. Allawi said in an interview. But he said he had insisted that the investigations be secret, unlike the practice at the commission, which has occasionally spoken freely to the Arab press.
Dr. Allawi said that during his tenure, he was appalled to learn of the commission's investigation into Mr. Damluji from a radio report. Then, after he stepped down, there was the raid on Ms. Lateef's house.
"Do you know what they did?" Dr. Allawi said. "They sent police to break into her house. You know, it reminded me of Saddam's days. And her neighbors, and most of them are ministers, they came to her rescue."
Dr. Allawi, a secular Shiite politician and member of the opposition in a National Assembly dominated by a Shiite party with a heavy clerical influence, insists there is more than a slight political tinge to the commission's work. But as an independent body, the commission did not change personnel with the arrival of the new government, possibly weakening that claim.
Mr. Shabot also points out that the commission can only investigate allegations and collect evidence, ultimately referring criminal cases to the courts. Many cases originate with inspectors general in the ministries and are sometimes sent back to the same officials if an administrative rather than a criminal punishment is called for. Nearly 130 cases have been handled in that way, Mr. Shabot said.
But Dr. Allawi and his supporters question the assertion that there is no bias. While the makeup of the commission has not changed, a number of inspectors did come in with the new government, said Nesreen M. Siddeek Berwari, the public works minister under both Dr. Allawi and the current government. She says those officials have shown political bias in their work. The new inspector in her own ministry is a Shiite closely linked with the new government, said Ms. Berwari, a Kurd who is under no suspicion of wrongdoing.
The new inspector has so far focused almost exclusively on cases involving Sunni Arabs and Kurds, she said, illustrating what she sees as a larger problem with the commission.
"I'm afraid that the current cases are politically motivated,'' Ms. Berwari said. "The new question -- how uncorrupt is the public integrity office?"
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Citation: James Glanz, "Iraqis Tallying Range of Graft in Rebuilding," New York Times, 24 June 2005.
Original URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/24/international/middleeast/24corrupt.html?ei=5070&en=4c0a7cd4523cb1bb&ex=1120190400&emc=eta1&pagewanted=print
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