FOREIGN MINISTER UNDER FIRE

C O N F I D E N T I A L FREETOWN 000518 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/22/2019 TAGS: PREL PGOV SL SUBJECT: FOREIGN MINISTER UNDER FIRE REF: A. FREETOWN 64 ¶B. FREETOWN 449 Classified By: Charge d'Affaires Glenn Fedzer for Reason 1.4 (B) ¶1. (C) Summary: Foreign Minister Zainab Bangura appears increasingly at risk of losing her job in the next cabinet reshuffle, with corruption charges, frequent absences from Freetown, and incompetence cited by the media as the leading reasons. Her favored position with the President (reftel A) may help her survive, and the corruption charges are mild by Sierra Leonean standards (and possibly fabricated),but her inability to manage her own Ministry may force Koroma's hand, and a rumored return to a UN position could provide a graceful exit. Bangura has been a supportive, if not always effective, advocate of good bilateral relations with the United States; her departure would remove a friend of the Embassy from Cabinet, but may result in a replacement better able to translate moral support into concrete policy decisions. End Summary. ¶2. (C) Speculation that Foreign Minister (FM) Zainab Hawa Bangura may be gone in the next cabinet reshuffle has surfaced again; she was already the subject of speculation regarding a cabinet reshuffle a year ago, with Minister of Information I.B. Kargbo rumored as a possible replacement. She survived, but her frequent trips overseas (not all official trips) and perceived inaction within the Ministry has removed her from the pedestal upon which she sat earlier in the Koroma administration. A November 12 public letter to President Koroma from John Benjamin, chairman of the opposition Sierra Leone People's Party (SLPP),accusing Bangura of corruption, and press claims that she is looking to oppose Koroma in the 2012 election, have re-ignited rumors of her impending departure, although much of the information swirling in the media is almost certainly concocted. ¶3. (C) Benjamin's extensive letter detailing a series of accusations ranging from plausible to absurd the day before the Consultative Group (CG) meeting in London (REFTEL B) had the clear but unsuccessful intention to cast a shadow on the administration's image in advance of its pleas to donors for additional funds. In the letter, he accused the Foreign Minister of diverting a shipment of rice donated by India and intended for sale to the public, to Dubai, where it was sold for personal profit. Though the allegations have never been substantiated, attempts by the FM to discredit them in the media backfired, as it garnered enough attention to spur the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) to launch an investigation. ¶4. (C) Allegations of corruption have been accompanied by assertions that the FM has squirreled away funds from her overseas trips to finance a run for President in 2012. She is also accused of poaching Presidential allies to support her in the race. These and allegations of further corruption -- she purportedly embezzled funds earmarked for Hajj pilgrims from the Moroccan government and the International Islamic Organization -- surfaced while she herself was in Saudi Arabia performing the Hajj, so her reactions were delayed and again ineffective, although her lack of support within the ruling All People's Congress (APC) makes a campaign highly unlikely. ¶5. (C) Accusations of mismanagement of the Foreign Ministry appear more valid, and even come from Bangura herself. During a 24 December meeting concerning UN votes with the CDA (a meeting that took nearly three weeks to arrange due to repeated last minute cancellations by the FM), Bangura spent the first twenty minutes asserting the incompetence of her own civil service employees (two of whom were present for the harangue),and her demands to President Koroma for a budget increase to hire competent people. She was frustrated that Sierra Leonean diplomats posted abroad were making decisions without reference to her policies, and in the case of UN votes, claimed the delegate had failed to send a list of upcoming votes to the Minister as ordered. In answer to CDA's concern about her inaccessibility, she said numerous other foreign diplomats had complained about it to her, including a group of all Freetown-based African diplomats who approached her jointly to register their concerns. She did not, however, posit an excuse or any intent to remedy the situation, instead reiterating her condemnation of her own staff. ¶6. (C) Bangura's civil service employees are in agreement that there is something wrong at the Ministry, but after two years with her as Minister, contacts in the Ministry blame her micromanagment and refusal to delegate decision-making authority, which paralyzes the Ministry during Bangura's frequent foreign trips. They further complain that the Minister is ineffective within Cabinet, citing one discussion (on a SOFA agreement with the U.S.),where she acquiesced to the Attorney General's demand for another month to review the text even though Bangura had been briefed minutes earlier that the AG had signed a letter saying he had a already reviewed the document. A copy of the AG's letter was included in Bangura's material for the meeting. ¶7. (C) COMMENT: Bangura came to government after many years as an international staff member for the UN, and lacks political ties with the APC party insiders who dominate the Cabinet. Before joining the government, she served with the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) as a P5, earning a salary between USD 104,600 and USD 131,019. As a cabinet minister in Sierra Leone, she likely earns less than a quarter of her prior salary. Whether or not allegations of corruption prove true, her relationship with the President might not be enough to secure her position much longer. A Presidential adviser told CDA that the UN may be lining up a job for her to work on gender issues, which would provide President Koroma an easy way to transition her out of the FM position without losing face. Bangura has been a reliable, if recently inaccessible and ineffective, partner on some key U.S. policies, most notably with Kosovo's independence, the Bilateral Maritime Assistance Agreement, and the return of the Peace Corps, but her management style has begun to seriously limit her ability to advance our bilateral relations and policy goals in Sierra Leone. END COMMENT FEDZER