WFP's OIG launches probe into its Sudan operations. Famine watchdog says 25M facing food crisis in Sudan

THIS sickening news is probably the tip of the iceberg in the multi-billion dollar business of humanitarian aid where corruption tarnishes the most honest humanitarians and donors who do their best to help people in need.

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Report from Reuters
By Giulia Paravicini and Maggie Michael
Dated August 28, 2024. Full copy for posterity:

Exclusive: WFP launches probe into its Sudan operations as famine spreads

Summary

• Inspector general examining two top WFP officials in Sudan -sources
• Investigators looking at whether staff hid alleged role of Sudan’s army in blocking food aid
• Probe also investigating disappearance of fuel supplies in Sudan
• WFP, USAID confirm investigation of Sudan operation is under way
• Famine watchdog IPC says 25 million facing food crisis in Sudan

NAIROBI/CAIRO, Aug 28 (Reuters) - The U.N. World Food Program is investigating two of its top officials in Sudan over allegations including fraud and concealing information from donors about its ability to deliver food aid to civilians amid the nation’s dire hunger crisis, according to 11 people with knowledge of the probe.

The investigation by the WFP’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) comes as the U.N.’s food-aid arm is struggling to feed millions of people in war-plagued Sudan, now suffering one of the world’s most severe food shortages in years.

As part of the probe, investigators are looking at whether WFP staff sought to hide the alleged role of Sudan’s army in obstructing aid amid a brutal 16-month war with a rival paramilitary for control of the country, according to five of the sources who spoke to Reuters.

One of those being examined in the inquiry is the WFP’s deputy country director in Sudan, Khalid Osman, who has been given a “temporary duty assignment” outside Sudan, a de facto suspension, according to six sources.

A second senior official, WFP area manager Mohammed Ali, is being investigated in connection with the alleged disappearance of more than 200,000 liters of the U.N. organization’s fuel in the Sudanese city of Kosti, according to four sources. Reuters could not confirm whether Ali remains in his role.

Osman and Ali declined to comment when contacted by Reuters, referring the news agency to the WFP’s media office.

Asked about the probe by Reuters, the WFP said that “allegations of individual misconduct related to irregularities in pockets of our operation in Sudan” are under urgent review by its inspector general’s office. It declined to comment on the nature of alleged wrongdoing or the status of specific employees.

The U.S. government’s aid agency, USAID, told Reuters in a statement that it was notified by the WFP on Aug. 20 of “potential incidents of fraud affecting WFP operations in Sudan.” USAID says it is the single largest donor to the WFP, providing nearly half of all contributions in a typical year.

“These allegations are deeply concerning and must be thoroughly investigated,” the USAID statement said. “USAID immediately referred these allegations to the USAID Office of the Inspector General."

The investigation comes at a critical time for the WFP, which describes itself as the world’s largest humanitarian organization. It won the 2020 Nobel peace prize for its role in combating hunger and promoting peace.

The WFP is battling severe hunger on many fronts. It is seeking $22.7 billion in funding to reach 157 million people, including some 1.3 million on the brink of famine, mostly in Sudan and Gaza, but also in countries such as South Sudan and Mali. In addition to distributing food itself, the WFP also coordinates and provides logistical support for large-scale emergencies globally for the wider humanitarian community.

In recent years, however, its operations have been rocked by diversion and theft of aid in countries including Somalia and Yemen. The WFP and USAID last year temporarily suspended food distribution to Ethiopia following reports of the widespread stealing of food aid there.

More than half a dozen humanitarians and diplomats told Reuters they are worried that mismanagement at the heart of the WFP’s Sudan office could have contributed to the failure so far to deliver enough aid during the war between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The conflict has been raging for more than 16 months.

The investigation at the WFP comes weeks after the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), an international technical group tasked with measuring hunger, determined that famine had taken hold in at least one site in Sudan’s Darfur region. The IPC has classified 13 other areas across the country as being at risk of famine. And it says that more than 25 million people, or over half Sudan’s population, face crisis levels of hunger or worse.

IMAGE 1 of 4 A volunteer distributes food to people in Omdurman, Sudan, September 3, 2023. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig/File Photo

Reuters reported in April that in some parts of the country, people were forced to survive by eating leaves and soil. In June, a Reuters analysis of satellite images showed that cemeteries were expanding fast as starvation and disease spread.

Aid workers say they have struggled to deliver relief, partly because of logistical constraints and fighting. But they also allege that army-linked authorities have hindered access by withholding travel permits and clearances, while RSF troops have looted aid supplies. Both factions deny impeding the delivery of humanitarian relief.

One focus of the investigation involves suspicions that senior WFP staff in Sudan may have misled donors, including U.N. Security Council member states, by downplaying the Sudanese army’s alleged role in blocking aid deliveries to areas controlled by the RSF, according to four people with direct knowledge of the matter.

In one instance in June 2024, two people with knowledge of the probe said, WFP deputy country director Osman allegedly hid from donors that authorities aligned with the army in Port Sudan had refused to give permission for 15 trucks to carry life-saving aid to Nyala in South Darfur, an area that includes communities at risk of famine. The trucks waited for seven weeks before they finally were granted permission to proceed.

Osman, who was promoted within the WFP’s Sudan office with unusual speed, had high-level army connections, according to eight sources. He exercised control over which WFP colleagues gained visa approvals to enter Sudan, allowing him to limit access and scrutiny of the army’s management of aid, according to three people familiar with the system.

Reuters was unable to independently confirm the allegations against Osman or what possible motive he may have had in misleading donors.

In its written response to Reuters, the WFP said it had taken “swift measures” to reinforce its work in Sudan due to the scale of the humanitarian challenge and following the IPC’s confirmation of famine in Darfur. “WFP has taken immediate staffing actions to ensure the integrity and continuity of our life-saving operations,” it added.

The war in Sudan broke out in April 2023. It has driven more than 10 million people from their homes, causing the world’s largest internal displacement crisis as well as worsening hunger, a spike of severe acute malnutrition among children, and outbreaks of disease such as cholera. The United States and rights groups have accused both sides of war crimes, which the combatants deny.

U.N. agencies have been operating out of Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast, where the army-aligned government relocated after losing control of most of the capital city of Khartoum early in the war.

The WFP and other U.N. agencies have complained that lack of access contributed to their inability to reach people in need, mostly in areas under RSF control such as Khartoum and the Darfur and Kordofan regions. But the aid agencies have largely avoided blaming either of the warring parties publicly.

In response to a request for comment about the military’s role in the hunger crisis, Sudanese armed forces spokesman Nabil Abdallah said the army is doing all it can to facilitate aid to “alleviate the suffering of our people.”

In response to questions, an RSF spokesperson said that the probe was a good step and that it should cover all humanitarian aid.

On Aug. 1, the IPC’s Famine Review Committee said that the war and the subsequent restrictions on aid deliveries were the main drivers of the food crisis in Sudan.

Some aid officials said they feared making public statements assigning blame, worrying the army could expel them from Port Sudan and they could lose access to army-controlled areas where hunger is acute.

View original report and VIDEO here: https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/un-world-food-program-launches-investigation-into-its-sudan-operations-famine-2024-08-28/

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Corruption is driving force behind Sudanese atrocities -George Clooney & John Prendergast of The Sentry

NOTE from Sudan Watch Editor: In an audio conversation conducted by BBC Newsday presenter James Copnall with US peace activists George Clooney and John Prendergast, James was told about those profiting from conflict in South Sudan and that corruption is the driving force behind the atrocities in South Sudan. In my view, it could also apply to Sudan. 

Here is a transcript I made from the audio originally released 20 Sep 2019. An undated copy was published at BBC Sounds online two days ago. Much of it applies to the situation today. Apologies if I mistakingly attributed any parts. The American accents were so similar I had to guess who said what. 

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From: BBC World Service Newsday

Release date 20 September 2019

Re-released two days ago, circa 09 May 2024 - here is a full copy:

George Clooney tells Newsday about those profiting from conflict in South Sudan

The corrupt financial transactions between some government officials and foreign companies should be targeted as the most effective way to curb the violence in South Sudan. 

This is the conclusion of research by The Sentry, an advocacy and investigation organisation based in the United States, which names individuals and businesses - including foreign state-owned oil companies - which it says have plundered the resources of the country for personal gain. 

Newsday's James Copnall spoke to George Clooney - the film star who co-founded The Sentry - and the organisations director John Prendergast.

Photo: George Clooney (R) and John Prendergast. Credit: Getty Images

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Transcript

JOHN PRENDERGAST: These war profiteers, these people who profit from human misery are extremely vulnerable in one way. They use the international financial system to move the proceeds of their financial crimes. When they do that in US dollars, and they do it in pounds, and they do it in euros, they become subject to the regulatory authorities and the banking systems, any money laundering efforts and we can work directly with governments and with banks to close those avenues, illicit financial flows off, and actually freeze and seize those assets so that it creates a real consequence, a real level of accountability for these kinds of crimes.

BBC: George, your activism has been around South Sudan and other issues too for many issues for many years was there something in particular that surprised you here?

GEORGE CLOONEY: Well, what’s an interesting thing, we’ve gone through a series of different versions of how we try to go after and stop these atrocities. We’ve tried putting satellite up in the air, we’ve tried, we’ve tried a lot of different things. Sometimes we’ve been successful, ultimately we’ve failed clearly because there’s an awful lot of violence that still goes on there. What became clear was that once we realised that we put on the front page of newspaper “troop build ups and mass graves” and nothing happened that they thought they could act with impunity [BBC: they could, couldn’t they? GC: they could and they have] but what’s also clear is if you sit down with a bank and you say well tomorrow I am going to hold a press conference that says you are laundering one hundred million dollars and I’m going to announce tomorrow that either you are doing something about it or not or you are complicit, it’s amazing how quickly they say you know what we don’t need to be in the business anymore of South Sudan.

JOHN PRENDERGAST: The whole system has been established in South Sudan to loot and if you can start to create a consequence for looting, you’re going to make a difference, you’re going to start to impact the calculations of folks that are making decisions about how they are going to run South Sudan.

BBC: [unclear] from Kenya, from Uganda, countries in the region, sometimes where the money goes, sometimes who may disagree with the conclusions you’re coming up with?

JOHN PRENDERGAST: So this is a really important point because the politicians left to their own devices in those neighbouring countries with business as usual. But Kenyans want the Kenyan banking sector to be the financial one-stop shopping for the entire region so they have to open themselves up to the international regulatory authorities, there is something called the Financial Action Task Force, we’ll put everybody to sleep if we talk about it, but the Kenyans are terrified if they get a bad grade from the Financial Action Task Force their whole banking sector is going to suffer. So suddenly they are like, okay yeah maybe we are in business with, some of our politicians are in league with these folks who are stealing from South Sudan but our entire future financial sector is at risk if we keep doing business. That’s a very significant counterweight and it gives us a chance to do something real.

BBC: Is it your contention that in the current situation people really shouldn’t be doing business in South Sudan at all because people will be saying this country needs people coming in?

JOHN PRENDERGAST: We want to encourage foreign investment, we want to encourage private sector development in South Sudan but if you talk to South Sudanese businessmen who aren’t on the take, if you talk to investors who want to do it clean they have no chance because the folks who are bringing suitcases full of money and putting it under the table and are hijacking these particular processes there’s no transparency.

BBC: [unclear] you cut out the financial dodgy dealing a big if ... there are still a lot of problems in South Sudan, ethnic tensions, political competition, this is a small part of a very big pond.

GEORGE CLOONEY: Except that the amount of money that’s coming in from and the kind of corruption, corruption is the driving force for these atrocities, you take away that giant piece of the puzzle and suddenly you know Salva Kiir doesn’t really have the same incentives and probably loses power. 

BBC: Even in the context where soldiers aren’t getting paid, when the economy has been bled dry already?

JOHN PRENDERGAST: Why are they not getting paid? Why is the economy being bled dry? Because of mass corruption. This is the cancer that eats away at the effectiveness, the potential effectiveness of the state. If you do not address it, which it has not been addressed, and then try to do things about everything else there is still this massive hole at the centre. And I think this is our argument. It is not a small thing, it’s not just a, it has repercussions for all these other things that makes everything else worse because the state has been captured and when you have a captured state and the objective of that state is to enrich the leaders of that, everything else that you are trying to do, supporting foreign investment, development, infrastructure, even child nutrition, even education, is being obstructed and undermined by the cancer of corruption.

BBC: So this is a conversation being carried out about international businessmen, about banking systems internationally, what about the South Sudanese guys sitting in a village in [unclear] listening to this on the radio, watching this on TV in Juba, what can they do in your view to change the system there?

JOHN PRENDERGAST: Well, you’ve seen a great deal of opposition to the system in the form of, sadly, in the form of armed rebellion, in the form of development of militias whether they are defending their own territory or attacking wanting to change the system. Sudan right to the north has created this incredible model where hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people kept demonstrating and kept marching in support of democracy and in support of peace despite tremendous repression and violence, state violence, against them. I feel like that the next wave in South Sudan in terms of people who are trying to make a difference because now if you try to make a difference if you try to challenge the system you’ll be killed or imprisoned. It’s a scary thing, people have to make choices. If you are going to take on the system you and your family will probably face severe repercussions but once the numbers get large and you start to see change as we’ve seen in Sudan and seen in other parts of Africa we may see a difference. I think that’s probably mass protest against war, against corruption, against dictatorship, is probably the thing that will make the biggest difference, it’s the people themselves that have got to take the reins and make the change.

BBC: You know what the South Sudanese government is going to say, don’t you, they’re going say, you going after us it’s regime change, western prominent personalities maybe backed by governments trying to bring us down, what do you say to that?

GEORGE CLOONEY:  If you think about what we’re saying is we think we should stop corruption. If the answer by the South Sudan government is you want regime change then you are saying that you are corrupt. That’s basically what you are saying. We’re not saying that, we are saying that we should stop corruption. 

Listen to the conversation here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p07ntymp

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