Iraq gov't ditching graft watchdogs

by Frank James

For Iraq to have the greatest chance at success in 2009 and 2010 assuming President-elect Barack Obama draws down U.S. forces to the degree he promised during the campaign, Iraq will need enough infrastructure to provide adequate services like electricity, fuel and education. it will also require a well-equipped security forces.

Meanwhile, since 2003 the U.S. has appropriated $50.77 billion of American taxpayer money for Iraqi reconstruction projects.

So it's very troubling that the Iraqi government is reportedly ridding itself of its internal watchdogs who keep an eye on corruption within the government.

As the New York Times reports in an important story:

BAGHDAD -- The government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki is systematically dismissing Iraqi oversight officials, who were installed to fight corruption in Iraqi ministries by order of the American occupation administration, which had hoped to bring Western standards of accountability to the notoriously opaque and graft-ridden bureaucracy here.

The dismissals, which were confirmed by senior Iraqi and American government officials on Sunday and Monday, have come as estimates of official Iraqi corruption have soared. One Iraqi former chief investigator recently testified before Congress that $13 billion in reconstruction funds from the United States had been lost to fraud, embezzlement, theft and waste by Iraqi government officials.

The moves have not been publicly announced by Mr. Maliki's government, but word of them has begun to circulate through the layers of Iraqi bureaucracy as Parliament prepares to vote on a long-awaited security agreement.

That pact sets the terms for continued American presence here after the United Nations mandate expires Dec. 31, but also amounts to a framework for a steady reduction in that presence. Such a change will undoubtedly lessen American oversight of Iraqi institutions.

This is obviously an area the exiting Bush and incoming Obama administrations will have to try to pressure Iraq on since whether the American experiment in Iraq succeeds or fails will depend largely on the Iraqi government's capacity to effectively provide services to Iraqi citizens, an ability threatened by corruption.