US aid agency demands Zimbabwe return $7,3 million

US aid agency demands Zimbabwe return $7,3 million

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Posted to the web: 03/11/2008 14:04:28
AN INTERNATIONAL organisation that fights AIDS and other communicable diseases is demanding that Zimbabwe returns millions of dollars in donations it says were misused.

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria says it wants US$7.3 million back from the US$12.3 million it deposited into Zimbabwe's Reserve Bank last year.

It has not said how the funds were misspent.

Communications director Jon Liden says the Zimbabwean government promised to return the money by Thursday.

The fund decides Friday whether to grant Zimbabwe's request for more funds.

Attempts to reach Zimbabwean government officials on Monday were not immediately successful.

John Parsons, the inspector general of the Fund told the New York Times Zimbabwe's actions also jeopardise a more ambitious $188 million Global Fund grant to Zimbabwe, due for consideration by the fund's board on Friday.

The breakdown of trust between the Global Fund and Zimbabwe's government comes at a time of widening humanitarian crisis and casts further doubt on the willingness of Western donors to invest heavily in rebuilding the economically broken nation as long as Mugabe is in charge, even if a deadlock over a power-sharing government is resolved.

According to the New York Times, the Global Fund deposited $12.3 million in foreign currency into Zimbabwe's Reserve Bank. He declined to speculate on how the $7.3 million it was seeking to be returned had been spent, except to say it was not on the intended purpose.

Parsons did offer an example of the human consequences of the Reserve Bank's failure to hand over the money for disease fighting. The Global Fund has brought in large quantities of medicines that can cure malaria, but has been able to finance the training of only 495 people to distribute them safely instead of the planned 27,000.

There were 2.7 million cases of malaria among Zimbabwe's 12 million people in the World Health Organization's most recent estimates.

"The drugs expire by the middle of next year, and it would be criminal if we can't use them because of these problems," Parsons said. "They've got quite a short shelf life."

Zimbabwe's information minister, Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, said he was not aware of the particulars of the disagreement, but he defended what he described as the Reserve Bank's good intentions and accused the Global Fund of politicizing aid.

"They always want to put certain standards and concoct certain things to make us look bad and horrendous in international eyes," he said.
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