Hungry for Truth, Peace and Justice

US aid to Rwanda not transparent– says Oxfam

By RNA Reporter
Thursday, 01 July 2010

Kigali: Government, recipient organizations and individuals which get US aid do not always have enough information about it to plan ahead and make the most of the assistance, says advocacy group Oxfam.

The group says in a new report that the United States is the least transparent than other major donors. This means that the aid data the US government provided was “not always available or timely, or comparable and comprehensive enough”.

The US spends considerable resources reporting its efforts in Rwanda and other countries but there is one serious shortcoming.

“The problem is with what the US does not systematically report: program and project operational details, including how much aid is actually spent on what activities, in what locations, and through which implementing organizations (such as specific contractors or NGOs),” says the report.

“These are the details recipients stressed when asked what kinds of information they would like to have on US foreign aid in their countries.”

Oxfam drew these conclusions from interviews with 200 representatives of governments, civil society and U.S. aid agencies, contractors and non-governmental organisations that run aid programmes in Rwanda, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Kenya and Liberia.

45 percent of respondents find the US less transparent than other donors. Some 26 percent who find the US to be just about the same as other donors don’t think other donors are particularly transparent either.

For example, Oxfam looked at the PEPFAR program. At $148 million in FY09, PEPFAR is said to be now the single largest source of funding for HIV treatment medication in Rwanda.

“However, despite major improvements in the transparency of the PEPFAR program in Rwanda, the efforts to develop a five-year plan for PEPFAR Phase II continue to be undermined by a disabling funding cycle, where Rwandan officials and US aid workers still rely on information on a yearly basis,” says Oxfam.

The result: according to a staff member of the USAID mission in Rwanda, “The way we work is to assume the money will be here.”

Meanwhile, a US implementing partner, awaiting an overdue announcement from USAID on whether the organization’s PEPFAR-funded project would be renewed, explained how in the meantime her organization was drawing on its own reserves to cover the operational costs of itself and its partners.

"Without transparency from donors, recipients can't hold their governments accountable and those governments cant plan, prioritise, or explain to their populations what they are doing; manage their fiscal and monetary policy; or strengthen the investment climate," said the report called "Information: Let Countries Know What Donors Are Doing".

Moreover, lack of transparency often fuels misperceptions about the intent of the U.S., it added.

The report recommends expanding relevant U.S. laws to require U.S. government aid agencies to provide the detailed aid information beneficiary nations need.

Although the Oxfam report does not mention the link between transparency and corruption in aid, researchers and aid officials agree the link exists.

Greater transparency will reduce opportunities for the misuse of aid funds and so make the money go a lot further, they say.

posted by Mamadou Kouyate @ 12:43 AM