United Press International
Dec 7 2004

Outside View: Kofi Annan — time to go

By Youssef M. Ibrahim
Outside View Commentator

Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Dec. 7 (UPI) — U.N. Secretary-General
Kofi Annan is the uppermost utopian model of international public
servants, a Nobel Prize laureate, a pride to his native Africa. These
are all the reasons he needs to leave the United Nations now.

Annan has been mortally wounded by allegations that his son, Koju,
and close U.N. associates profited from the United Nations’
oil-for-food program.

The program was put in place in 1996 for the purpose of feeding the
Iraqi people during the harsh regime of economic sanctions imposed on
Iraq.

While the program has probably saved millions of Iraqis from
starvation, it was allegedly badly misused by some U.N. officials in
collusion with hordes of oil merchants as well as senior Iraqis,
including Saddam Hussein himself, to steal at least $10 billion.

Annan almost certainly had nothing to do with either the alleged
misbehavior of his son or the manipulation of the entire oil-for-food
program by Saddam, the oil merchants and their suspected U.N.
accomplices.

The U.N. officials who ran the undertaking reported not to Kofi
Annan, but rather to the Security Council. Why the Security Council
members, particularly the United States, did not do more at the time
is a question indeed.

But the harm was done at the expense of the Iraqi people, and — just
as distressing — it all happened on Kofi Annan’s watch. The suspects
are now under an independent investigation conducted by the former
chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve Paul Volcker.

But we already know that Koju Annan is accused of using his father’s
name to extract at least $130,000 from a Swiss company involved in
the oil-for-food deal. Compared with the others, it seems he was not
a smart manipulator, but rather a small player.

One undersecretary-general of the United Nations, Benon Savan, an
Armenian Cypriot who has largely disappeared from public view and is
on leave from the United Nations, is being investigated for allegedly
realizing illicit profits in the tens of millions of dollars, perhaps
as much as $100 million, in return for turning a blind eye to
Saddam’s scheme of using discounted oil sales to hoard his billions
outside the sanctions system.

I met Savan three times in Vienna as a reporter covering OPEC
meetings of oil ministers as well as in New York at his U.N. office.

By virtue of his job, I have no doubt, he had access to these “oil
vouchers,” which are tickets to buy Iraqi oil at discounted prices.

It remains for the investigation to determine if he and others
resisted the temptation to sell those vouchers to oil traders who
then lifted the oil and paid the U.N. guys a cut.

Since 1996, when the oil-for-food came into effect, we suspected that
a lot of cuts, a lot of vouchers and a lot of money was tucked into
the pockets of some officials.

Still we have to wait for due process. Annan does not have to wait.
The buck stops at his office door on the 38th floor of the United
Nations tower building. He must assume responsibility.

Given the ferocity of his and the United Nations’ enemies — centered
in the George W. Bush past and future administration along with
American jingoistic neo-conservatives — Annan should be in no doubt
he will have to go eventually.

When the previous Bill Clinton administration went after Boutros
Boutros-Ghali, Annan’s predecessor, it did not relent until he left.

Compared to the current gang in the White House, the Pentagon,
Congress, the Senate and the various right-wing think tanks, the
Clinton folks were nice guys.

Here are some thoughts for Kofi Annan: One has to fight fire with
fire. If I were he, I would have the following quiet reflection:

“For reasons including Machiavellian twisted ones, it would be far
better for me, Kofi Annan, to leave sooner rather than later. I am
facing a feeding frenzy by these sharks that this White House is only
going to agitate among its media friends, administration and think
tanks.

“If I left now, however, I would pull the carpet. For starters, my
departure would be dignified and principled. Second, the world will
hold it against those barbarians who time and again have tried to
come after the United Nations to paralyze it and run amok with their
unilateral policies of world domination.

“I, Kofi Annan, do not need the United Nations now. It is the United
Nations that now needs my help. I am in a position to save it from
this abuse. I can more effectively fight those guys from outside the
United Nations.

“The gang of George W. Bush will persist in their misadventure in
Iraq, which I, Kofi Annan, denounced a few months ago as an ‘illegal
war.’ This they have not forgiven me for. But the charge stuck, and I
can continue my denunciations as I have all the files and facts.

“The gang will pursue its war against multilateral organizations,
agreements and their quest for unilateral power. The United Nations
is right, front and center in their effort.

“I can be a goalkeeper preventing, deflecting, these attacks. By
staying at the helm I’ll make myself a distraction, give them a
target and be quiet.

“By stepping down now, the world will see these sharks for what they
are. The U.N. membership, if anything, will become ever more hostile
to hegemonic policies. Other world coalitions can emerge, with which
I can help.

“My life’s work speaks for itself. I will be leaving as one of the
most respected, most admired and most appreciated secretary-generals
of the United Nations ever. I have much more to do, as my hero Nelson
Mandela of South Africa has proven after leaving office.”

Bon voyage, Kofi, and God speed.

—

Youssef M. Ibrahim, a former Middle East correspondent for the New
York Times and Energy Editor of the Wall Street Journal, is Managing
Director of the Dubai-based Strategic Energy Investment Group. He can
be contacted at ymibrahim@gulfnews.com

—

This essay first appeared in Gulf News

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress