Malfeasance in Foreign Aid: the Essay

Some images first to set the scene:

Link to Tweet and full article in DEVEX by Sophie Edwards.
My comment at the end of the article:

Forward:

This piece is about a definition submitted to Wikipedia I hope to add to Foreign Aid literature so that misconduct whenever it occurs is not kept being seen in isolation but part of a wider phenomenon peculiar to the sector, with circumstances creating a culture that tolerates it instead of deterring it.

As well as "Malfeasance in Foreign Aid", there are three closely-related pages:

Abuse of Power

Malfeasance in Office

Development Aid - section on Corruption

My suggestions for amendments here can be found below "Notes".

There is some excellent work done by Oliver May, formerly of OXFAM, including an excellent tool-kit that should be used extensively by all charities and NGOs operating abroad.

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Malfeasance in Foreign Aid

Malfeasance  [1] in Foreign Aid [2] or Development Aid [3] is wrongdoing by an officer or agent of an organisation, public or private, not-for-profit or commercial, engaged in the administration and arrangement of funds and assets given for the relief and development of people in need usually in a “developing” or “least developed country”. [4].  Malfeasance also occurs in Humanitarian Aid. [5] (Old English includes the word "misfeasance".)

Malfeasance in Foreign Aid has existed for many years, reported as far back as 2002 [6] and before, but has become more well-known after 2017 because of serious cases rapidly receiving widespread attention in mainstream and social media.

Children know best!

This article was written when child abuse scandals were to the fore on tiny St Helena and in Australia but meanwhile it was also lurking in the greater depths of the worldwide Catholic Church and across so many establishment institutions in many countries not just the UK. Ironically the UK with its "advanced" system of social services has been found most wanting for example in the Church of England, and most prominently in terms of publicity in the "Rotherham" scandal.  One thing was apparent above all others - covering-up and denials. Can adults be trusted? If not, should we not just trust children more as indeed proven by Cambodian children? (First advocated 20 years ago.)

Article for St Helena Independent

Thea surprised us all.  For a start she was a girl [1].  She was neither the oldest nor the brightest. She was one of the more disabled in our troupe of mixed-ability children.  She had been reluctant to join.  She was shy.  Yet there was no mistaking it.  Thea (short for Sokunthea) had emerged as their leader.  All the children were poor [2].  That’s why they were with us.  They just wanted to be like “normal” children [3] able to learn Computing and English, a small element in our project for mainly poor and disabled people with two main components. One was to improve livelihoods. The other “was to do something about their low status”.

Going up in the world!

Street 251 Takhmau - our new concrete road elevated 1 metre above surrounding land

The idea behind this blog had been in my mind for a long time.  Apart from the sad case of the Boeung Kak Lake community who had lost their homes, and Phnom Penh city a wonderful amenity, the way we have been treated in Takhmau illustrates just what keeps going wrong.  There is a dedicated up-to-date blog about our own case.

May 2019 - Robin Spiess in the SE Asia Globe has written a great relevant article about Takhmau.

Going up in the world?  Or from one extreme to the other?

A blog continuing the theme of comparing and contrasting Northumberland (UK) with Cambodia, and how things can be done better, lessons learned, if there is the good will to do so.

Planning permission to build or change land use in the United Kingdom is often a long-winded process, if for good reasons.  In Cambodia it’s the exact opposite and for reasons known only to a select few.

When the cat's away the mouse will play

The Governing Council of a local Cambodian NGO, elected representatives of community self-help groups of disabled people, who pursued a complaint against a UK charity 2008-13 on behalf of their members, 800 families in Tuok Phos District, Kampong Chhnang province, Cambodia. Photograph John Lowrie.

Foreword:

Public life comes under scrutiny and fire whenever someone falls from expected standards. In developed democracies where there is good knowledge of standards, usually people falling well-short - and superiors responsible for them - can be held to account. Those are the advantages of an educated population; a system of checks and balances; rule of law and a free press to try to bring about accountability.
  

When it comes to “#foreignaid” and charities operating abroad, such as OXFAM and Save the Children who were recently caught up in scandals, those advantages don't usually exist. It's where all kinds of malfeasance can occur.

Fascinating Back Streets and Coal-Shed Doors

Alnwick – one of the backstreets we would use often as children. Today you don't see children playing there. The old tin dustbins are gone, replaced by wheelie-bins but one family is still using the old-fashioned clothes- line instead of the modern  indoor electric clothes-drier.  It was fun to cycle or run through all washing lines pegged with clothes hung out to dry to the shouts of many a woman upset we were soiling her washing.  Quite often soot from chimneys did a better job than us.  This picture was taken from beside the once railway line near Alnwick Station, now housing Barter Books - I write about them and their "Keep Calm and Carry On" fame here.

Despite suffering a pique of jealousy – because a friend got there before me – I want to relate my fascination with back streets. I was pipped at the post to extol the virtues of the “The Run” in Jamestown Saint Helena. [See poem below] It must, however, be one of the best, possibly the very best of back alleyways in the world.  I have come across a few other candidates for the title.  Some like the ones I talk about here in Alnwick, Northumberland, qualify because of their past glory, hence this blog. Others like our current street in Takhmau, Cambodia, make the list because in many respects they are today like others were in the [good] old days.

"Your mission is over. You go!"

The fine levied on me for overstaying my visa Cambodia

"Your mission is over. You go!"

Those were not the words anyone would want said to them after 20 years of service, half an entire working professional career in Cambodia, but those were the final words in impeccable English delivered by the grim-faced Immigration Official, a senior uniformed and well-decorated Police Chief, at Phnom Penh Airport on 23 February 2018.  I had to pay my fine of US$220 to him for the privilege too.  That is more than a week's of my UK state pension, the source of income that enables me to continue to give voluntary support to causes in Cambodia.

UK: Should Human Rights Matter More than Trade?

A still from this video capturing the live-fire shooting by Cambodian Security Forces on demonstrators. GR or GRK as worn on uniforms is the acronym for Royal Gendarmerie. You can see a report by VoA.  VoA broadcasts to the domestic audiences have been curtailed  because  many independent radio stations have been forced to cease airing in 2017.

In July 2005 armed police killed a young unarmed Brazilian outside Stockwell train station in London.

In January 2014 armed military police killed 4 o 5 young unarmed Cambodians near a factory in VengSreng Street, Phnom Penh. The whereabouts to this day of one person there Khem Sophath is unknown and therefore regarded as an "enforced disappearance."