Iraq IG cites successes in reconstruction oversight

Members of the House International Relations Committee squabbled at a Thursday hearing over whether the panel had conducted sufficient oversight of Iraq reconstruction, while government officials painted a picture of steady, if slow, progress in an endeavor suffering far more from security problems than fraud, waste and abuse.

Rep. William Delahunt, D-Mass., led a chorus of criticism that the committee had not spent sufficient time on oversight. "After how many years are we beginning to discuss the reconstruction in Iraq?" he asked, claiming a lack of hearings supports a public perception that the committee is not interested.

Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R.-Ill., responded with an accounting of the committee's activities over the past few years, including five full-committee hearings, three subcommittee hearings and a number of briefings. Others pointed to the panel's work investigating the United Nations' Oil for Food program.

"There are many debatable points about our policy toward Iraq, but the gross mismanagement of reconstruction efforts is not one of them," ranking member Rep. Tom Lantos, D.-Calif., argued. "During the reign of the Coalition Provisional Authority, almost $9 billion … moved through Iraqi ministries with little or no accounting for results."

Cutting through the debate, Stuart Bowen, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, said fraud and corrupt practices are no longer a major factor, in part due to a program of aggressive oversight by his office, which maintains a staff of 50 auditors, inspectors and investigators in Baghdad. Bowen served as inspector general of the CPA until his office transferred to its current role, overseeing the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund, in late 2004 when the CPA was closed out.

Bowen cited recent successes -- including five arrests, two convictions and more than 70 open investigations into alleged fraud and corruption -- as evidence that aggressive oversight is working in Iraq.

In an April report to Congress, Bowen's office identified five major challenges facing the reconstruction effort: improving infrastructure security, closing the "reconstruction gap" of projects that have fallen behind plans, revitalizing the Iraqi oil and gas industries, fighting corruption in Iraqi institutions and increasing financial participation by other countries in the reconstruction.

James Jeffrey, the senior adviser on Iraq to the secretary of State, testified that "there's a great deal of corruption in the Iraqi public sector," and noted that the supplemental appropriations request for Iraq includes funding for building local capacity, including for inspectors general within the Iraqi government.

Rep. Adam Schiff, D.-Calif., pushed Bowen to identify American officials who had been held responsible for mismanagement in the reconstruction effort. Dismissing the "minor players who have committed outright graft," Schiff urged the inspector general to look beyond the 960 cases of fraud being pursued against Iraqis.

Bowen could not point to Americans, other than those charged with illegal activities, who have been held accountable for management failures. He said the office is developing a lessons-learned report on reconstruction contracting, and reiterated that the reprogramming of funds from infrastructure projects to security is a significant factor in the reconstruction gap.