2006: 8 Trillion YR Contracts Violate Law
I would have thought that when the donors granted Yemen 4.7 billion in development aid, one precondition would have been to cancel the the 2.3 billion (USD) purchase of Mig SMT fighter planes. Beyond military spending, there’s billions lost to corruption. COCA is a good organization. Unfortunately their findings are rarely acted upon, with few to no prosecutions of corrupt officials.
YO An official report filed by the Central Apparatus for Monitoring and Accounting uncovered violations committed by the leaderships of the Capital Secretariat in implementing a number of projects, with a total cost estimated at YR 8,705,988,674.
The report, filed on October 12, 2006, indicated that an examination of the projects implemented in the Capital Sana’a resulted in the discovery that some enormous projects executed in the year 2006 were conducted by a direct order from the leaderships of the Capital, in violation of the law requiring the referral of big projects to the high commission of tenders.
A number of projects were executed in violation of the law, including a project to pave and asphalt the eastern ring road, with a total cost of YR 2.7 billion; the project of widening and improving the Western entrance of the Capital, with a total cost of YR 1.8 billion; the project to pave and light Northern 60 Street, with a total cost of YR 661,165,494; and the project to expand and light Southern 60 Street, with a total cost of YR 448,406,680.
The total of the executed contracts was YR 8,705,988,674. The newly elected Secretary General of the local council of the Capital Secretariat, Ameen Juma’an, said he had not heard about this report and that he didn’t have any details about the projects that had been executed during the rule of the former local council head, whose authority ended last September. An investigative committee determined that the money for these projects came not from the local council, but from the Ministry of Finance, said Jamal al-Khawlani, the former general secretary of the local council.
He spoke with former governor Ahmed al-Kholani, to tell him these projects were illegal. But al-Kholani said that they were not the council’s responsibility, because the money was coming from the Ministry of Finance. In other news, in the Aden governorate, Judge Nora Al-Qatabi, the chairwoman of the public funds prosecution office of Aden governorate, announced that 217 cases of embezzlement of public funds have been referred to the prosecution of Aden since the beginning of this year.
Among these corruption cases figured 13 offenses committed by high administrative leaderships, some of them women. Investigations are being carried out. According to legal procedures, the accused persons will be dealt with equally, regardless of their gender.
And there’s more:
SANA’A, Nov. 18 — There have been several financial and administrative violations wasting over YR 100 billion in the Ministry of Public Works and Highways, according to the Central Organization of Control and Audit’s 2005 third quarterly report.The report says the ministry failed to implement various strategic road projects, the cost of which had been approved as part of the ministry’s budget for 2005. It said YR 3.6 billion were allocated to 20 projects, which the ministry failed to implement.
The report added that YR 104.5 billion, which had been approved for five tarmac road projects, was spent on other non-planned projects. These new projects, however, still are listed among the projects under implementation in order to receive allocations in coming years.
The Ministry of Public Works and Highways spent a total of YR 3.3 billion on 44 tarmac road projects without any financial allocations for these projects in the ministry’s 2003 investment program, the report revealed. Other numerous projects received allocations during the same year, however these projects had not been listed in the budget.
The Central Organization of Control and Audit remarked that as implementation of projects in many sites was halted and the completed parts in these projects have become subjected to deterioration and damage by rains and their water courses were blocked due to a lack of maintenance.
The organization reported the Ministry of Public Works and Highways hired contractors to prepare studies and designs and paid their costs, however, the General Administration for Studies and Designs in the ministry is the party responsible for these works according to the law.
The organization criticized the in the Ministry of Public Works and Highways that led to raising the cost of projects and failure to complete the projects on time. It noted the ministry doesn’t coordinate with service bodies, such as electricity, water and sanitation corporations.
