Is it a mark of no confidence in regional executives?

Samisoni Pareti
The Secretariat of the Pacific Islands Forum—the premier political body for Pacific Islands Leaders—is operating without a budget.

This follows the refusal by officials of the 16 Forum member countries to adopt the Secretariat’s 2008 Budget at their meeting in Tonga in September last year.

To-date, the Suva-based secretariat is surviving on a rarely-used provision of its financial regulations in which Secretary-General Greg Urwin—in the event the secretariat’s budget is not approved on time for the next financial year—can authorise expenditure of up to two-thirds of the previous year’s amount.

According to figures obtained by ISLANDS BUSINESS, last year’s total expenditure for the secretariat stood at F$38.426 million.

If this figure is correct, then it would be mean that PIFS, the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, will need to work around a temporary budget of F$25.61 million for 2008.

This is only a stop-gap measure however, as the Forum Officials Committee—the budget authorising body for PIFS—is scheduling an extraordinary session in April initially scheduled for Tonga but may now be moved to Fiji for cost containment reasons.

Between last September and next month, PIFS’ corporate services division was told by the Forum Officials Committee (FOC) to review its figures, re-prioritise and reduce costs where possible.

FOC meetings are never opened to members of the public, including journalists. Unprecedented security at the Tonga Forum meeting last year meant the news of the rejection of the PIFS budget is just trickling out now.

Five months after the event, this magazine has been told the Tonga budget session was stormy, with several delegates member countries expressing concern at the high deficit projected in the proposed 2008 budget.

Meeting costs: One or two delegates—we have been told—were more cutting in their questions, complaining about the cost of regional meetings and the number of secretariat staff attending such meetings.

The cost of one such meeting was singled out—the Forum Economic Ministers Meeting which carried a tab of F$530,000 in 2007.

Corporate Services staff explained the high cost was more to do with the venue of FEMM (Forum Finance and Economic Ministers Meeting) which was Palau, in the north-western Pacific, a member nation that trades in US currency.

Travel, it was also explained, formed a huge component of the Palau FEMM budget.

Some delegates remained unsatisfied and questioned the need to still factor in the same cost of FEMM (F$530,000) for 2008, when the meeting will be hosted by Vanuatu.

The Cook Islands Government delegation—we have been told—wanted to know the breakdown of the secretariat’s marketing budget of F$582,382 in 2007.

According to them, the money was exhausted by June, just half-way through the year.

A few delegates were put off by the responses they were getting from corporate services personnel of PIFS.

“Questions were answered with ‘from the top of my head’ responses,” a delegate from one of the 16 members of PIFS told ISLANDS BUSINESS. In fact, the delegate, it is understood, complained to Secretary-General GregUrwin regarding the responses.

“If this was a national budget session, some people in that department would have lost their jobs.”

Another delegate the magazine contacted believes the budget rejection has serious implications for PIFS staff, in particular, its senior executives.

Vote of no confidence: “The lack of approval is a huge vote of no confidence in the management of the secretariat,” this delegate who requested anonymity said.

“In fact, there should be heads rolling or people resigning—especially those at the senior management level. There is something serious happening. 

“The best thing is to call for a Commission of Inquiry—similar to what the Secretariat of the Pacific Community went through several years back.”

In total, the magazine submitted 12 questions to PIFS on the matter, the last three questions focusing specifically on the implications to senior management of the rejection of the 2008 budget.

ISLANDS BUSINESS asked: “For Forum member countries, the government of the day resigns if its budget is not endorsed in parliament.

“If the same rule is applied here, shouldn’t the rejection of your budget be seen as a vote of no confidence on the management at PIFS?”

Another question was: “In your view, should the most senior executive of PIFS take the blame and tender his resignation?”

“Some delegates said they were insulted by the no care attitude and the feeling of indifference displayed by your senior officials during the budget session in Tonga,” was our final question, adding: “Queries by delegates were answered by “from the top of my head” type of remarks.

“Why hasn’t heads rolled at PIFS because of this?”

PIFS responded to the magazine’s queries but opted not to address the final three questions.

Urwin himself is on medical leave so the responses were provided by acting Secretary-General Feleti Teo.

“At the Tonga meeting, the members were informed the cost of the 2008 work programme which is framed to capture all the work required of PIFS exceeded the revenue predicted,” wrote Teo.

“The discussions on the budget highlighted the need to prioritise activities in the work programme and consider “smarter and more cost effective” ways of undertaking the work required of PIFS.

“The secretariat was asked by members to revise the work programme and budget by reprioritising the priorities to match the available funding resources and to significantly reduce operational costs.”

Teo raised a point that at least one other FOC delegate had told ISLANDS BUSINESS; that the budget’s operating expenditure was unavoidable given the increasing amount of work PIFS is expected to do using the same amount of money that has remained unchanged for the last 12 years.

Since 1996, when the last increase of membership dues was implemented, PIFS has had to formulate, revise and fund the implementation of its Pacific Plan, coordinate the Regional Assistance Mission in Solomon Islands (RAMSI) and oversee other members in crisis like the funding of the Eminent Persons Group (EPG) on Solomon Islands and Fiji.

In addition, the number of ministerial meetings required to be convened every year kept on increasing.

The implementation of the EPG initiative on Solomon Islands, for example, drew a budget of F$233,777 in 2007 and PIFS is projecting a figure of F$287,000 a year for 2008 to 2010.

Said Teo: “The Pacific Plan and the growing regional political and trade agenda had expanded the secretariat’s functions very significantly in recent years.

“On the other hand, there has been no increase in membership contributions since 1996. Nor is there currently any mechanism which allows for the adjustment of membership contributions to take into account inflation and the rising costs of doing business.

“The membership acknowledged this fact during the Tonga meeting.

“The increase in activities also meant the surpluses from previous years which had traditionally been available to fund future work programmes had been substantially reduced.” For someone who has been a regional civil servant for almost a decade and holding executive positions at regional institutions at that, Teo knows what needs to be left unsaid.

It is a fact though that much of the blame for the ballooning costs of PIFS lies squarely with its members.

For instance, one of the items they were harping about in the Tonga FOC meeting last September was the colossal cost of PIFS-organised meetings.

Yet these government officials have forgotten that PIFS is merely implementing a clear decision of the Pacific leaders that meetings ought to be decentralised, and that its headquarters in Suva cannot be hosting all the meetings.

That is why, Niue, the Forum’s smallest member with a population of 1200, is hosting this year’s Forum meeting most probably in mid-August.

The cost of the Niue Forum—excluding the Niue and New Zealand governments’ contributions—has been pegged at F$340,397—almost a $137,000 hike from last year’s budget of $203,500 in Tonga.

Told to revise its operating budget downwards, meeting costs—unpalatable perhaps to some islands countries—will be the first victim.

Credible information provided to this magazine shows that PIFS is now proposing that most of its meetings should be held at its Fiji Secretariat. Meetings that are usually scheduled annually—like the ministerials on civil aviation, economic affairs, education, ICT, foreign affairs and trade—are also being reviewed to see whether they could be turned into biennials, or triennials even.

Teo confirmed that a revised budget with a trimmed operating expenditure was circulated to members before the end of 2007.

By the end of the scheduled feedback period, only four countries had sought clarifications or provided their views.

This, sadly, is a common feature of regional initiatives, something regional bureaucrats like those working in PIFS have grown accustomed to over the years.

Discussions in meetings could be lively, even fiery on occasions, but when written responses are sought, participation—the magazine has been told—reduces to almost zero.

By the end of February 2008, the revised budget for the year has got the support of four of the 16 member countries—Australia, Cook Islands, New Zealand and Samoa.

It goes without saying that Fiji’s support is assured if the revised budget is proposing that most of the meetings need to be held at the Suva secretariat.

These countries’ support hinges on certain conditions; that most meetings ought to be held in Suva and those member countries should foot more of the cost of their members’ participation at such meetings.

Budgets for convening annual meetings of economic and trade ministers were particularly singled out, and PIFS has assured the four supportive countries that the costs of these  meetings would be reined in.

It seems the Suva-based secretariat has also taken on board criticisms levelled against the high number of PIFS staff attending regional meetings. ISLANDS BUSINESS was told that FOC had for instance questioned the need to send more than 30 secretariat staff to last year’s Forum trade ministers’ meeting in Port Vila.

Total cost of that meeting came to over F$500,000, we have been informed.

PIFS has promised to control staff attendance from this year and that a meeting template has been drawn up for FOC’s consideration at its April extraordinary budget session.

Teo said with most meetings to be held at its Suva headquarters, the need for PIFS staff to travel more often would also be drastically reduced.