FUND BOSS QUITS

    The shock waves of the scandal hit the Global Fund headquarters in Geneva early this month when Richard Feachem, the boss of the GF secretariat, resigned following a probe into the involvement of his wife in the GF business.

    "I have decided not to seek a full further term", Feachem said in a statement, citing both professional and personal reasons for his decision to end his four year term early due in July.

    Feachem, a British national, took up his position as the first Executive Director of the GF in July 2002 a year after the GF was launched by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in June 2001.

    His wife Neelam Sekhri, who is at the center of the scandal at the Geneva based body, is a health specialist who owns a consulting firm, Healthcare Redesign Group, Inc. based in the U.S..

    Health officials in Kampala, who were being probed over mismanagement of GF money, also claim there were attempts "to arm twist the country into doing business with Neelam."

    The scandal came out with a newly designed medicine and supplies distribution system, opposed by recipient countries including Uganda who claimed they preferred to buy cheaper drugs and medical supplies through other channels than to receive them from designated distributors.

    But instead an audit and the subsequent commission of inquiry into the management of the funds have unearthed shocking details of how ministers and members of the Project Management Unit (PMU) mismanaged the money.

    Annan had called for the international community to donate 10 billion dollars annually to the GF, which aimed at helping poor countries with sound proposals for buying medicines and improving their healthcare services in order to treat the millions dying of the three diseases.

    Meanwhile an accountant for the Global Fund was ordered by Justice Ogoola to refund over 65 million shillings (35,000 U.S. dollars) unaccounted for in her duty.

    Mary Musoke, who worked at the PMU of the Global Fund as a management accountant, received three sums of money worth 46 million shillings, to organize three workshops for 35 participants near Kampala.

    However, she deposited the money on her personal account and later accounted for it with what Ogoola described as "cooked up things."

    Ogoola told her that the checks were written in her names and deposited on her account making her responsible for it. Enditem