Chapter Four - HAP International

THE 2008 HUMANITARIAN ACCOUNTABILITY REPORT
15. OFADEC
When UNHCR received the complaint, a number of meetings were held with the refugee students, OFADEC and UNHCR to discuss the students’ case.
During the meetings, OFADEC provided an explanation and informed the committee that the students had received all the payments and, in fact, no
payment was missed. It became clear that the confusion was based on a change within the funding cycle. As the scholarships were paid according to the
calendar year and the payments were made according to the school year (from October to September) the students were not clear on which months would
be funded and which months were not. Once the change was explained to them, most of students understood and agreed that OFADEC had not mishandled
their scholarship funds. However, some students continued to disagree with the explanation and continued to argue their point.
At this stage, OFADEC suggested that the students form an investigatory committee to verify all the information presented over the course of the meetings
and furthermore, that the committee would be welcome to examine the related records to attest that indeed each student had received their full 12-month
support. Five students were selected to form a student committee and over the course of four days, working with OFADEC’s accountant, the committee met
at the OFADEC offices and checked all the records from 2004 to 2008. The student committee tracked the records of every student in receipt of support for
the period, looking through all financial records including every payment made, received and utilised; each cheque, and bank transfer was examined.
At the end of the examination, the students verified and held a debriefing with OFADEC and UNHCR, where they presented their findings and acknowledged
that all recipients received the five payments required over the course of each year. During the debriefing, the student committee also made two
recommendations as to how OFADEC might better organise the payments. As a result of the committee’s report, OFADEC prepared a file of each student
with the following documents: cheque numbers, a tally of payments made, payments received, signatures on the corresponding voucher, and payment
dates. As UNHCR was considered an independent third party OFADEC provided these documents to them as a form of verification. UNHCR followed up by
inviting four students to their office in order to review their files, and all acknowledged that they received their complete payments between 2004 and 2008.
During this meeting, the students recognised that no fraud had taken place.
Finally, to help ensure that similar misunderstandings do not occur in the future, OFADEC announced to all their refugee students that they are welcome to
review their own cases and report any fault if they found there to be one.
Plans with regard to: undertaking a baseline analysis, a certification audit, or mid term certification review
A mid-term monitoring audit was planned to take place in January 2009.
Progress in / highlights from the field (if not otherwise covered above)
During 2009, the key is to improve the humanitarian accountability framework:
• To strengthen refugees knowledge of the SINFOR and their rights to complain
• To strengthen staff and refugee knowledge of the UNHCR and NGO Red Cross Code of Conduct
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