The other week Jonathan Schanzer wrote:Read the whole thing.
However, in recent years, Fayyad has been sidelined by PA President Mahmoud Abbas. Abbas has consolidated power, and he is now abusing it.
One egregious example is the Palestine Investment Fund. The PIF was created in 2002 to manage and distribute the money and commercial interests owned by the PA. The bylaws were established so that its operations would be transparent, since the PIF effectively functions as a sovereign wealth fund. The PIF succeeded in bringing hundreds of millions of dollars of commercial assets in the Palestinian budget into the light of day. The PIF's operating procedures call for the Fund to operate as an independent vehicle for economic stimulus for the benefit of the Palestinian people. In recent years, however, Abbas changed the charter, installed his own choices for board members, placed the PIF under his full control, and neglected to have the PIF audited by outsiders. Today, Prime Minister Fayyad has zero oversight of the PIF, despite his celebrated mandate for transparency.
Maybe more attention should have been paid to the accusations made this past July about Palestinian Arab money disappearing under Abbas's watch:
Ousted Fatah official Muhammad Dahlan over the weekend launched a scathing attack on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, accusing him of dictatorship and financial corruption.The question is whether Abbas in fact did consolidate that money.
He said that more than $1 billion have gone missing from a fund that was handed over to Abbas after he was elected president in 2005.
...Dahlan said that the dispute with the PA president erupted after he demanded to know what had happened to $1.3b. that was in the account of the Palestinian Investment Fund.
The PIF was established in 2000 as an independent Palestinian investment company “committed to maximizing the assets’ value for its shareholder: the Palestinian people.”
According to its website, PIF’s chief objective is “to safeguard and consolidate the Palestinian people’s investments and property, both in Palestine and abroad.”
Hat tip: MP
Technorati Tag: Abbas.
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