The UN Pension Fund's internal email system should not be used to support non-transparent and unrepresentative institutions such as FAFICS (the Federation of Associations of Former International Civil Servants) and its associations, including AFICS/NY (the New York chapter of the Federation).
Recently, the Fund administration circulated a membership letter on behalf of AFICS/NY to all Fund members through the Fund's internal email system.
I think it’s important to flag two issues here. One is that in terms of its current pension policies, FAFICS, the umbrella organization for AFICS/NY and other AFICS associations, practices taxation without representation.
For several years, the same person was both the president of AFICS/NY and FAFICS, and still continues, along with the Vice-Chair of the Pension Committee, to wield outsize influence in AFICS/NY, in FAFICS, and on pension matters on the FAFICS delegation to the pension board.
While recognizing efforts on the part of the current AFICS/NY leadership toward more transparency, it's a fact that its leadership, of the association with the highest membership among the 61 FAFICS associations, has been largely passive and complicit in these unrepresentative practices, including out of hand rejection of the proposal in OIOS' (Office of Internal Oversight Services) governance audit (A/73/341) that the Pension Board review modalities for UN retirees to directly elect our representatives to the Pension Board. One of the specious reasons offered by the FAFICS leadership for rejecting the proposal, is that FAFICS has no access to the UNJSPF membership!
It’s the reason that I continue to withhold my membership dues to AFICS/NY and recommend that others follow suit, until, at the very least, the membership of the FAFICS delegation to the Pension Board changes (see article linked below).
The second is the use of UNJSPF email system to disseminate messages from FAFICS associations. The OIOS comprehensive governance audit was explicit in describing various conflicts of interest between the FAFICS leadership and the management of the Fund, including the “appearance of collusion” in the use of the UNJSPF internal email system to disseminate a January 2018 letter from the then FAFICS president, containing several misleading statements to 200,000 plus Fund members, of which a small fraction-- 18,000 ---were FAFICS members. Yet, the FAFICS leadership consistently claims that it's the sole legitimate representative of all UN retirees.
Here’s the quote in paragraph 27 of the governance audit: 27. “The Fund secretariat circulated that letter electronically to all registered beneficiaries, including the vast majority who were not members of FAFICS. The circulation of such a letter by the staff of the Chief Executive Officer gave the appearance of collusion between FAFICS and the Fund secretariat to challenge the authority of the Secretary-General and the General Assembly in governance matters of the Fund, even though the Chief Executive Officer was to be reappointed by the Secretary-General on the recommendation of the Board, and would ultimately be accountable to the Assembly. In a letter of February 2018, the outgoing president of a retiree association affiliated with FAFICS indicated to members of that association that the leadership of FAFICS “should be strongly reminded by its members that its task is to protect, defend and advance the rights of all United Nations retirees, not those of the Chief Executive Officer …”. That statement is consistent with complaints from other retirees that FAFICS was protecting the interests of the Chief Executive Officer instead of those of retirees.”
FAFICS' statutes and rules of procedures are treated by its current leadership as mere window-dressing. Until FAFICS changes its non-transparent and undemocratic practices, its associations, including AFICS/NY, should not be allowed to use our Fund’s (we are the owners) internal email system and Fund members should not support its associations with membership dues.
In fact, all UN retirees should boycott FAFICS and its associations until and unless the leadership changes its non-transparent and unrepresentative practices.
In fact, all UN retirees should boycott FAFICS and its associations until and unless the leadership changes its non-transparent and unrepresentative practices.
No comments:
Post a Comment