UNDP.DO supports Multi-stakeholder Partner Cheap

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To: "'Antoine Khoury'" <[email protected]>
From: Daniel Pimienta <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Allegations against UNDP Dominican Republic - non payment of work
Cc: "paula saddler" <[email protected]>, [email protected], [email protected], "Renate Bloem" <[email protected]>, "Tony Hill" <[email protected]>

Dear Mr. Khoury,

I sincerely appreciate the effort of your office in trying to sort out the referred matter and I acknowledge the difficulty of following the facts in such complex case.

Your letter shows that this effort was done genuinely and we thank you for that, however the foundation of your argumentation is flawed due to a confusion.

When you say "INDOTEL worked with many civil organizations, including your organization (...) which was paid 26,000 US$ in November 2004 for work perform under this project" your are victim of a confusion beetwen different facts.

The payment you mention is related to another project called http://socinfodo.org.do, also with INDOTEL, but totally independant of e.Dominicana and of UNDP, and for which the payment was also delayed due to the change of government.

The request of 8600 US$ is NOT related to an additional claim but precisely to the full payment of the work accomplished for e.Dominicana, an effort for which FUNREDES (not FUNDREDES) was the only civil society organization involved in the coordination.

You also mentionned "that UNDP has been accused of failing to honour its contractual obligations". We have always tried to stated clearly that the obligations of UNDP in that matter was not "contractual" but rather of partnering in a multistakeholder approach, with a responsibility of institutionnal and financial warrant.

I am afraid that if the final conclusion from UNDP on this matter is based on contractual considerations and on a confusion between two different projects it is not good notice for civil society organizations willing to invest time and energy in multistakeholder partnerships with UNDP and I hope your office will reconsider a position based on wrong premises.

In any case, I am grateful for your interest and will complete the public file with this exchange, leaving civil society interested parties free to make their own judgment based on respective argumentations.

In our opinion the message which would go across is definitively discouraging for civil society to engage in multistakeholder partnerships with a government, under the umbrella of UNDP.

Cordially,

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Chronology

Funredes' contract (10/2003)

Letter where Funredes concludes the contract (29/2/2004)

First claim letter to Indotel (10/2004)

Formal answer from Indotel (12/2004)

Informal answer from Indotel (10/2004)

Second claim letter to UNDP and Indotel (5/2005)

Formal second answer from Indotel (6/2005)



Relevant links and documents