Angry Wolfowitz in four-letter tirade

Richard Adams in Washington
Tuesday May 15, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
An angry and bitter Paul Wolfowitz poured abuse and threatened retaliations on senior World Bank staff if his orders for pay rises and promotions for his partner were revealed, according to new details published last night.
Under fire for the lavish package given to Shaha Riza, a World Bank employee and Mr Wolfowitz's girlfriend when he became president, an official investigation into the controversy has found that Mr Wolfowitz broke bank rules and violated his own contract – setting off a struggle between US and European governments over Mr Wolfowitz's future.

Sounding more like a cast member of the Sopranos than an international leader, in testimony by one key witness Mr Wolfowitz declares: "If they f#*! with me or Shaha, I have enough on them to f#*! them too."

The remarks were published in a report detailing the controversy that erupted last month after the size of Ms Riza's pay rises was revealed. The report slates Mr Wolfowitz for his "questionable judgment and a preoccupation with self-interest", saying: "Mr Wolfowitz saw himself as the outsider to whom the established rules and standards did not apply."
The report brushed off Mr Wolfowitz's defence that he thought he had been asked to arrange Ms Riza's pay package, observing that "the interpretation given by Mr Wolfowitz ... simply turns logic on its head".
The investigators have sent their completed report to the bank's governing board, containing a string of withering criticisms of Mr Wolfowitz's behaviour and casting doubt on his ability to continue running the bank, a multibillion-pound international agency with 12,000 staff based in Washington.
According to the report, Mr Wolfowitz's actions "had a dramatic negative effect on the reputation and credibility" of the bank.
It concluded that "the damage done to the reputation of the World Bank group" should lead the bank's board to "consider whether Mr Wolfowitz will be able to provide the leadership needed to ensure that the bank continues to operate to the fullest extent possible".
It also said: "Mr Wolfowitz's contract requiring that he adhere to the code of conduct for board officials and that he avoid any conflict of interest, real or apparent, [was] violated."
Despite the weeks of turmoil within the bank, Mr Wolfowitz may still keep his job if the US government is prepared to stick by him.
Mr Wolfowitz still enjoys support from the Bush administration, where he served as deputy defence secretary at the Pentagon during the invasion of Iraq.
Yesterday vice president Dick Cheney defended Mr Wolfowitz, saying: "Paul is one of the most able public servants I've ever known .... I think he's a very good president of the World Bank, and I hope he will be able to continue."
The US treasury secretary, Hank Paulson, was yesterday said to also be drumming up support for Mr Wolfowitz, while European governments increasingly despair of US intransigence in allowing Mr Wolfowitz to hang on.
The angry comments attributed to Mr Wolfowitz came from damning testimony by Xavier Coll, head of human resources at the bank, who provided investigators with his notes of a meeting with Mr Wolfowitz last year. The notes directly contradict Mr Wolfowitz's assertions that the details of Ms Riza's treatment were properly shared with senior bank officials.
In March last year, when a mention of Ms Riza's secondment outside the bank to avoid rules about partners was first published in the magazine US News & World Report, an angry Mr Wolfowitz accused Mr Coll of leaking the information.
According to Mr Coll's notes: "At the end of the conversation Mr Wolfowitz became increasingly agitated and said that he was 'tired of people ... attacking him' and 'you should get your friends to stop it'. Mr Wolfowitz said, 'If they **** me or Shaha, I have enough on them to **** them too'," naming several senior bank staff he felt were vulnerable.
Mr Wolfowitz appears before the bank's executive board today to make a final defence of his actions, with the board meeting tomorrow to consider the report and make a statement later in the week.
With Mr Wolfowitz so far refusing to step down, the board may need to take radical action to break the stalemate. Members have discussed a range of options, including sacking Mr Wolfowitz, issuing a vote of no confidence or reprimanding him. Some board members argue that a vote of no confidence would make it impossible for him to stay in the job.

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World Bank report: Wolfowitz broke rules
Updated: 2007-05-15 08:38

WASHINGTON - World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz broke bank rules in arranging a hefty compensation package for his girlfriend, a situation that has caused a "crisis in the leadership" at the institution, according to a report released Monday by a special bank panel.

World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz is shown in this 2006 file photo in Monrovia, Liberia. [AP]


The special panel said the full 24-member board must consider whether Wolfowitz "will be able to provide the leadership" to ensure that the bank achieves its mission of fighting poverty around the world.
The board will ultimately decide Wolfowitz's fate.
Board members have discussed a range of disciplinary options. It could fire Wolfowitz, ask him to resign, signal that it lacks confidence in his leadership or reprimand him. Board members have been leaning toward an expression of no confidence or other tough language that would make it difficult - if not impossible - for Wolfowitz to stay on.
Wolfowitz is scheduled to make an appearance before the board Tuesday. The proceedings are not public. A decision could come as early as Tuesday or Wednesday.
The controversy that has put Wolfowitz's job in jeopardy involves his handling of the 2005 compensation pay package for his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, a bank employee.
The special bank panel concluded that Wolfowitz's involvement in the details of the package "went beyond the informal advice" given by the bank's ethics committee and that he "engaged in a de facto conflict of interest," the report stated.
Riza worked for the bank before Wolfowitz took over as president. She was moved to the State Department to avoid a conflict of interest but stayed on the bank's payroll. Her salary went from close to $133,000 to $180,000. With subsequent raises, it eventually rose to $193,590.
The panel concluded that the salary increases Riza received "at Mr. Wolfowitz's direction (were) in excess of the range" allowed under bank rules.
In addition, the special panel said it was of the view that the controversy "had had a dramatic negative effect on the reputation and credibility" of the bank and had raised "serious questions" about the bank's governance and ability to carry out its mission. The special panel also raised fears that the fracas could hinder the bank's ability to raise billions of dollars from countries around the world to provide financial help to poor countries.

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he is losing it.

if i had realized being his girlfriend paid so well i would have applied for the job myself.

tom w

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

It's a common theme with the PNAC crowd - no moral compass. Most people have a little voice in their head that tells them when they are headed in a bad direction. Wolfowitz, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Kristol, et al., apparently were born without it.

Wolfowitz refuses to quit Bank, wants name cleared

By Lesley Wroughton Wed May 16, 7:49 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz refused on Wednesday to bow to heavy European pressure to resign as he sought to clear his name in negotiations with the bank's board over a possible exit strategy. "Mr. Wolfowitz will not resign under this cloud and he will rather put this matter to a full (board) vote than to capitulate on his integrity," his lawyer Robert Bennett (news, bio, voting record) told Reuters.
Several European countries have said Wolfowitz should step down to salvage the bank's credibility, which they say has been damaged by his handling of a high-paying promotion for his companion, bank Middle East expert Shaha Riza.
The controversial former deputy U.S. defense secretary and architect of the Iraq war has insisted he acted in good faith on the advice of a board ethics committee in overseeing the promotion of Riza and has said he wants it to acknowledge its own failures.
A board panel found his efforts on her behalf broke bank rules and represented a conflict of interest.
Board sources said talks were launched on Wednesday over how to push the dispute to a close. Some members have suggested a resolution that would recognize the panel's findings and Wolfowitz's efforts to resolve the conflict of interest issues over Riza, but also acknowledge mistakes by the board.
However, the board adjourned until Thursday without a decision.
Under a contract he signed in June 2005 when he became World Bank president, Wolfowitz would receive a year's salary, or around $375,000, if his service were terminated by the board or if he resigned.

PRESSURE TO RESIGN
Pressure to resign intensified on Wednesday as European countries signaled they would resist a bid by the United States to keep Wolfowitz in the job.
Wolfowitz had been scheduled to attend a meeting of the Group of Eight finance ministers in Germany this weekend.
But German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul said Wolfowitz was not welcome to take part in a two-day World Bank forum on development aid for Africa that starts on Monday in Berlin.
"He would do the bank and himself a great service if he resigned," Wieczorek-Zeul, one of Wolfowitz's strongest critics, told reporters in Berlin.
"It would be the best thing for all concerned."
European countries have had misgivings about Wolfowitz since his nomination by President George W. Bush in 2005, at the height of bitter tensions between the White House and Europeans over the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
The White House publicly maintained its support for Wolfowitz on Wednesday.
"We stand by our support of Paul as the World Bank president," White House spokesman Tony Snow said.

Tensions increased after the U.S. administration tried to a cut a deal that would have separated consideration of Wolfowitz's ethics violations from a decision over whether he had the credibility to continue, but only Japan out of the G7 countries sided with the United States. G7 sources said most board members wanted a quick resolution to the protracted dispute, which has paralyzed the bank for more than a month.

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Line him up against the wall and shoot the Gazotski.

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