At UN, Questions of Ban's Son in Law's Hirings and Promotion Unanswered, In Denmark

By Matthew Russell Lee
July 23, 2009
The Inner City Press
Original Source: http://www.innercitypress.com/uns1family072309.html http://www.innercitypress.com/uns1family072309.html
UNITED NATIONS, July 23 -- In today's United Nations, questions of possible http://www.innercitypress.com/unpga2clarks060909.html nepotism and family connections have become taboo. Few pose or pursue them and if asked, they are not answered. The lack of transparency starts at the very http://www.innercitypress.com/unpga1entertain062309.html top. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's son in law Siddharth Chatterjee, well placed sources tell Inner City Press, has recently transferred with a promotion from the UN Mission in Iraq, from which patron Staffan de Mistura has left, to the UN Office of Project Services in Copenhagen, Denmark, under a new patron, Jan Mattsson. 
   In late May, Inner City Press traveled with Ban Ki-moon and senior advisors including his speech writer to Sri Lanka and back. On the return leg, after photo opportunities including a scene in the government run internment camp in Vavuniya in which http://www.innercitypress.com/untrip2may2srilanka052309.html detained children sung the name of Mr. Ban, the UN plane stopped in Copenhagen. An environmental conference for business executives was taking place in the Bella Center, which will host December's climate talks.
  Outside the Center, Inner City Press met and interviewed an official from the UN Development Program. He said his job that Sunday was to drive Mr. Ban's wife to meet with the wife of UNOPS chief Jan Mattsson. He added incongruously that he'd been told to wait off to the side of these meeting of spouses. Inner City Press http://www.innercitypress.com/untrip2may6srilanka052509.html alluded to this in its dispatch from Copenhagen, wondering but not directly asking if this was an appropriate use of UN money and staff time.
   In New York this month, well placed UN sources told Inner City Press that Siddharth Chatterjee had quietly shifted from the UN in Baghdad to UNOPS in Copenhagen back in early May, once it was clear Staffan de Mistura was leaving his post of Ban's envoy in Iraq to take the number two post in the World Food Program. (Inner City Press was the first to report de Mistura's departure and replacement by UNDP's Ad Melkert, http://www.innercitypress.com/un6119muse061109.html here and http://www.innercitypress.com/un1chairsiraq061809.html here.) The sources, speaking on condition of anonymity due to express fear of retaliation, said that Ban's son in law was getting a promotion.
  When Chatterjee took the Baghdad job as de Mistura's chief of staff, he was slated for a promotion. After Inner City Press and then the Washington Post wrote about it, the UN quickly and some felt defensively announced that Chatterjee would not be moving up a grade in UN pay scale. The Post reported that This has greatly upset the U.N. rank and file, who are fretting that maybe Chatterjee is trying to leapfrog other qualified staff to get the assignment  
 When Inner City Press http://www.innercitypress.com/mistura101907.html asked about it, spokesperson Michele Montas replied http://webcast.un.org/ramgen/ondemand/pressbriefing/2007/brief071019.rm?start=00:12:35 on video that we feel the publication of any information that increases the risk to any staff member and to the mission as a whole is not very helpful. (Apparently this argument is now being extended from Baghdad to Copenhagen). Team Ban hastened to argue that since Chatterjee had known de Mistura before, no nepotism was involved and again that the hire should not have been reported at all.
  But de Mistura, as a savvy UN player, has a history of hiring the relatives of powerful Headquarters officials. He hired the son of Kofi Annan's chief of staff Iqbal Riza, even creating a middleman for payment to skirt rules or scrutiny. The source opine to Inner City Press that Mattsson, until recently criticized in the UN system for UNOPS' lack of audit and then identified system flaws, is emulating de Mistura. It is a fact that during the recent New York meeting of the executive board of UNOPS and UNDP, Ban issued a ruling that gave Mattsson greater freedom in staffing decisions, used to increase the number of higher level D-1 and D-2 positions at UNOPS in Copenhagen.

Against this backdrop, Inner City Press on July 20 asked Ban's speech writer, who is also the Director of Communications, about what whistleblowing staff had said of Chatterjee. Under Kofi Annan, Inner City Press would simply have gone to then UN spokespeople and asked a factual question, as it once did about a trust fund controlled by the family of Annan's wife. Such factual questions deserve factual answers; counter interpretations of the facts can be offered too, and included as quotes in stories. On this story, all that Team Ban has said is that Ban is concerned about safety, and sensitive to family.
  Also on June 20, Inner City Press put factual question about Chatterjee to Ban's chief Spokesperson Michele Montas. She said she would get the answers. Inner City Press said, in light of Team Ban's argument that Ban is sensitive to family matters, that it would choose to question and await answers outside of the UN's formal noon briefing. At the http://www.un.org/News/briefings/docs/2009/db090721.doc.htm June 21 noon briefing Inner City Press asked about Sri Lanka, Ethiopia and Afghanistan but not the Chatterjee questions, choosing instead to approach Ms. Montas afterwards expecting response to the simple factual questions. But none were given. 

  Nor the next day, June 22, on the eve of Ban's and his Spokesperson's trip to China and Mongolia. On July 23 a 10 a.m. debate on the http://www.innercitypress.com/pga4r2picg072209.html Responsibility to Protect hosted by General Assembly President Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann will not include Ban due it's said to his trip. A source on Ban's 38th floor, long after working hours, nodded despairing, why don't they just answer the questions? To refuse to just makes Ban look worse, adding hopefully that http://www.innercitypress.com/un5vspress062909.html management, http://www.innercitypress.com/un1leakerbeware061309.html media relations and http://www.innercitypress.com/ban1reviews070109.html communications changes may be made for the good of the UN during Ban's time in his native country in August.
  The UN's own Office of Internal Oversight Services appears to do nothing in this regard. Even in the face of the President of the General Assembly's http://www.innercitypress.com/unpga1entertain062309.html unexplained http://www.innercitypress.com/unpga2clarks060909.html hiring with UN money of two relatives, reported first by Inner City Press and then the Times of London, OIOS has not acted. Inner City Press asked and was told that jurisdiction is being looked into, but that complaints by anonymous sources, even those fear retaliations, should not be given weight. 
  The issue arose at a recent UN noon briefing, where Inner City Press was told that no more questions about the hirings would be accepted. At much lower levels of governance, questions about boss' son in law being hired and promoted within the Organization would be asked and answers given. Why is it different within this UN? Watch this site.