No Millenium Challenge grants: Philippines flunks graft test!

The consolation prize is that the government is eligible to apply again next year. The government spin is to emphasize this aspect of the decision even though for now the government will get nothing. The fact that govt. flunked shows just how bad corruption must be within the government. This is from the Tribune (Manila)


Graft-ridden GMA gov’t flunks MCC test, no US grants for RP


By Michaela P. del Callar

12/11/2009

The Philippines under the Arroyo government has again failed to secure a large scale grant from a United States aid agency due to the long-standing problem of corruption in her government.

At a board meeting held in Washington Wednesday (Thursday in Manila) by the Millennium Challenge Corp. (MCC), however, the Philippines was re-selected to apply anew for additional funding for its development projects.

The results of its recent corruption test, which the Philippines flunked, had a great impact on the decision of MCC Board of Directors at its quarterly meeting when its directors selected and reviewed eligible developing countries for compact funding. Manila would have received additional $500-million poverty-reduction funding from the MCC only if it had passed the MCC’s anti-corruption index.

Control of corruption is considered by the MCC as the only pass/fail indicator. No country can receive funding under the Compact program unless it passes at least half of the 17 indicators and the Control of Corruption indicator.

This is the third time, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs, that the Philippines was endorsed as Compact eligible, allowing the country to qualify for a large scale-grant for fiscal year 2010 under the Millennium Challenge Corp.’s Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) program. The MCC Board of Directors is headed by US Department of State Secretary Hillary Clinton.

“The re-selection reaffirms both MCC’s confidence in the Philippines’ high capacity as development partner and the Philippine government’s highest level of political commitment to good governance,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo said, in trying to put a spin on the failure.

Romulo is optimistic that Manila would finally qualify next year following its re-selection to apply for compact funding by the MCC.

Millenium Challenge Corp. still sending aid to Honduras.

This is from this site. The Millenium Challenge Corp. is chaired by Hilary Clinton. The U.S. has still not been able to determine whether the coup was a military coup--a decision that would legally require even more aid to be cut off. This article shows how the Obama administration through this Corp. is still funding projects since the coup govt. took control.


The board of directors of the Millennium Challenge Corp., a U.S. aid agency funded by taxpayers and chaired by Secretary of State Clinton, on Sept. 9 issued a press release indicating that it had voted to terminate $11 million in funding for Honduras related to two transportation projects and also to "put on hold" another $4 million in assistance pegged for yet another road project.
The road-improvement funding is part of a five-year (2005-2010), $215 million aid compact between MCC and the government of Honduras.
“Good governance and accountability are at the heart of our poverty reduction programs, and governments that are inconsistent in these areas jeopardize not only MCC funding, but also the long-term impact that good policies can have on growth in their local economies,” MCC’s Acting CEO, Darius Mans, said in a prepared statement announcing the Honduran aid cut.
But was it really an aid cut?
MCC spokesperson Sarah Stevenson told Narco News last week that as part of her agency’s $215 million compact with Honduras, as of Aug. 31, MCC had “committed approximately $191 million to contracts; approximately $91 million has been disbursed” — actually sent to Honduras.
She added that the $11 million in funding terminated at the Sept. 9 board meeting involved money not yet committed under contract. Although she failed to address the $4 million put on hold, the MCC press release makes clear that money also is linked to funds that have not been “contractually obligated.”
A simple math computation tells us, then, that MCC still has some $100 million in contractually committed funding to deliver to the putsch regime in Honduras between now and the end of 2010.
In fact, according to recent reports released by the Honduran Central Bank, MCC has delivered $10.7 million to Honduras since the June 28 coup — including $3.8 million in late August, a little more than a week prior to MCC’s funding-termination media show. And the balance of the MCC funding can be expected to continue to flow into Honduras, to the benefit of the putsch regime, to the tune of an additional $100 million, in the weeks and months to come.
U.S. Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens has previously stated that terminating the remaining $100 million in contractually committed MCC funding in Honduras would create major legal liabilities for the U.S. government. But that assessment seems to be a dodge, if not an outright fabrication.
The MCC aid funds are distributed to Honduras through an independent government agency, called MCA-Honduras, set up in Honduras under that nation’s laws and whose board is dominated by members of the putsch regime. In addition, MCC’s own compact language makes clear that “MCC is not a party” to the contracts inked by MCA-Honduras with vendors.
From MCC’s Web site:
These [contract] procurements are awarded and administered by the country [Honduras] through an “accountable entity” (also known as an “MCA Entity”) … established by the country to manage the programs identified in their Compact. MCC is not a party to these contracts.
So, it would appear, based on the structure of its funding program, if MCC chose to cut off the remaining $100 million in contractually committed aid under the Honduran compact, it would be the Honduran putsch regime that would be on the hook legally and economically for making good on the contracts
— and not the U.S. government.