Supplementary information from the European
Community of Humanitarian Office (ECHO)
FACT SHEET: UCLAF ENQUIRY ON ECHO CONTRACTS
FOR THE 1993-94 PERIOD
Following the confusion among the press and
the public opinion due to some misunderstandings on the UCLAF
enquiry, it would appear necessary to provide some elements of
clarification, based upon objective considerations.
I. THE FACTS
An enquiry as been carried out by UCLAF into
four contracts drawn up by ECHO during the 1993-94 period. Some
suspicion of irregularities concerning some of the funding (estimated
between 400,000 and 600,000 from a total amount of 2,4 MECU) have
been detected. These findings justified the suspension of a Commission
official and the transmission of the dossiers to the competent
judicial services, the Public Prosecutor's Office in Luxembourg.
The contracts under review referred to operations in Bosnia and
in Africa. Nevertheless, resources were not taken from the beneficiaries
of humanitarian aid: they were contracts of monitoring, evaluation
and technical assistance that were mainly used to allow ECHO
to function in Brussels.
One must not confuse fraud and administrative
irregularities. The latter being linked to the non respect
of the financial regulation and the budget, as approved by the
budgetary authority. This should not be confounded with the fraud,
a concept of penal law which implies that there has been perception,
misappropriation or embezzlement of public funds.
It is perhaps useful to remember the reasons
which pushed the Services to look for flexibility in the administrative
procedures, sometimes in an almost acrobatic manner. Heavy and
new responsibilities were entrusted to the Commission by the Council
and the European Parliament at the beginning of the 1990s. The
urgency of these tasks, quite often external, and the inadequacy
of the resources immediately available were at the origin of the
"acrobatic" administrative procedures which were brought
to an end by ECHO in June 1995.
II. THE FIGURES
The overall amount of the four contract that
have been review by UCLAF is 2,4 MECU. As a result of the investigation,
UCLAF was able to use the available documentation to justify 696,000
ECU.
Lately, the Secretary General of the Commission
asked ECHO to try and reconstitute the amount of the services
effectively provided under those contracts, from the documentary
evidence available and the declarations made by the personnel
working at that time in ECHO.
The results of this research were submitted
by ECHO to the Secretary General on the 18 July: reconstruction
by approximation and extrapolation of the expenses (salaries,
rent, social charges, equipment, etc.,) carried out in the framework
of these contracts. The findings of this study demonstrated that
the expenses were justified up to an amount of 1,800,000 or 2,000,000
ECU. It is on these grounds that the Commission believes that
the amount paid out by the Commission and which remains to be
justified is between 400,000 and 600,000 ECU.
In any case, it will be the Public Prosecutors
Office in Luxembourg, who has been called upon by the Commission
in this affair, who will have the last word on this subject.
III. THE CONTEXT
It seems necessary to recall under which conditions
the Humanitarian Office—created in 1992 and becoming in
six years the most important donor of humanitarian aid—had
to face (in 1993 and 1994) the two largest crises of this age:
Firstly ex-Yugoslavia and then in the region of the great Lakes.
Figures can easily show the inadequate ratio staff/financial
resources to be managed by ECHO at a time in 1992 when ECHO
had only 34 officials to manage 368 million ECU.
In 1993 the budget rose to 604 million with
a staff of only 50 officials (three of them temporary agents).
In 1994 ECHO had a budget of 764 million ECU
(and almost 1,200 contacts) with only 63 officials (out of which
10 of them were temporary agents).
| ECHO, budgetary resources, number of contracts, human resources (1992-98)
| | | |
| | |
|
| Year | Budget (MECU) | Number of contracts
| Human resources |
| | |
|
| 1992 | 368 | 416
| 34 |
| 1993 | 605 | 882
| 50 |
| 1994 | 764 | 1,181
| 63 |
| 1995 | 694 | 1,300
| 83 |
| 1996 | 657 | 1,420
| 98 |
| 1997 | 442 | 1,297
| 105 |
| 1998 (at 5 October 1998) | 380
| 955 | 108 |
| | |
|
| Total | 3,910 | 7,451
| — |
| | |
|
| | |
|
Today, ECHO has 108 officials but this is still not sufficient
considering the enormous task to be carried out. The results of
a recent OECD report on the ratio "staff/amount of aid"
demonstrate that ECHO is understaffed, not only in comparison
to other Commission services but also with regards to services
in the Member States, or even international humanitarian agencies.
IV. TRANSPARENCY
The claim that the Commission lacked transparency is unfounded.
It was the Commission and no one else who took the initiative
of starting this enquiry and who, one in possession of the result
of the enquiry took the appropriate administrative measures and
informed the legal authorities.
Following the results of the enquiry, the Commission, on
several occasion, provided the other institutions with appropriate
information. The Commission has always taken into account the
need for discretion which is necessary for such an Institution
when faced with questions that affect people's rights and
which are the subject of a legal enquiry.
Public opinion and newspapers have also had access to an
appropriate level of information through the usual channels (Press
room, briefings, etc.,) taking into consideration the already
mentioned constraints.
ECHO
10 October 1998
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