World Bank Pledges `Expeditious' Ruling on Wolfowitz

World Bank Pledges `Expeditious' Ruling on Wolfowitz

Calls of ``resign, resign'' resounded through the World Bank's atrium yesterday when Wolfowitz, 63, addressed employee representatives. Staff Association head Alison Cave said it was the first time the group had called for a bank president to go.

Wolfowitz sent a memo to the bank's personnel manager ``directing him to reach an agreement with the staff member and specifying in detail the terms and conditions,'' the directors' statement said.

Release of documents may be fatal blow

There were also fresh challenges to Mr Wolfowitz’s suggestion that he was acting to protect the institution when he secured a large pay rise and promotion for a bank official with whom he was romantically involved.

The board was told there was no real risk that the bank would be successfully sued by the woman concerned, Shaha Riza, if she had been asked to leave with compensation rather than be offered an attractive secondment package, the bank’s then senior legal officer told the Financial Times.

Mr Wolfowitz said in a statement on Thursday that he had acted partly “in order to take responsibility for settling an issue that I believed had potential to harm the institution”. He “believed there was a legal risk if this was not resolved by mutual agreement”.

I’m a wronged woman, says girlfriend in Wolfowitz scandal

THE British woman at the centre of a scandal that could force Paul Wolfowitz to resign as president of the World Bank has said that she is a victim of the controversy and that she was forced to change jobs against her wishes because of their romantic relationship.

Shaha Ali Riza, a bank official who was moved to the State Department with a large pay rise after Wolfowitz’s appointment, revealed her distress in a memo to an investigating committee.

“I have now been victimised for agreeing to an arrangement that I have objected to and that I did not believe from the outset was in my best interest,” she wrote.

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The scandal and controversy surrounding World Bank President and prominent “necon” Paul Wolfowitz continues to blossom:


The U.S. Defense Department ordered a contractor to hire a World Bank employee and girlfriend of then-Pentagon No. 2 Paul Wolfowitz in 2003 for work related to Iraq, the contractor said on Tuesday.

A spokeswoman for Science Applications International Corp., or SAIC, said the Defense Department’s policy office directed the company to enter a subcontract with Shaha Riza, under which she spent a month studying ways to form a government in Iraq.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A deputy to Paul Wolfowitz urged the World Bank chief on Wednesday to resign in the interests of the institution during a meeting of the bank's management, sources who participated in the meeting said.

The sources told Reuters that World Bank Managing Director Graeme Wheeler, a bank veteran named by Wolfowitz as one of his two deputies a year ago, raised the issue at a meeting of the bank's vice presidents.

Asked to comment, World Bank spokesman Marwan Muasher said: "I feel it is inappropriate to comment on private meetings."

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The board's failure to reach a quick decision gives Wolfowitz, 63, more time to marshal support among the bank's 185 member nations as he seeks to hang on to his job amid demands from employees that he quit.

Wolfowitz's contract and possible conflicts of interest will be considered by the ad-hoc group, as well as arrangements made on behalf of his partner, Shaha Riza, 52, described in the statement as the ``staff member closely associated with the president.'' The board will also look into job contracts of people in Wolfowitz's office and public communications made by the bank related to the matter.

Bank officials warn Wolfowitz 'a liability'

Bank officials around the world were being told that the bank should put its own house in order before it started preaching at other people to clamp down on bribery and political chicanery, they said.

“As is known, there are reports from the field offices of concrete cases where the bank’s policy dialogue and operational work on governance and anti-corruption are being undermined,” the group wrote in the letter, obtained by the Reuters news agency.

“The credibility of our front line staff is eroding in the face of legitimate questions from our clients about the bank’s ability to ’practice what it preaches’ on governance.”