EU fraud investigators have recommended that funds to Goal be suspended because of alleged inadequacies in the relief agency's accounts. The result of the investigation by the European Commission's fraud unit, UCLAF, comes as a fresh blow to Goal after the decision of the Department of Foreign Affairs to suspend its funding of new projects.
Late last night the Department said it "regrets that GOAL has dramatised what should be a straightforward issue, namely the accountability of GOAL as a body receiving public funds. No other aid agency has a problem with this."
A senior EU Commission source said UCLAF had recommended stopping Goal's financing because the quality of its accounts "simply aren't up to scratch". He stressed that UCLAF's decision was not based on any suspicion of fraud.
The report's results were communicated on Friday to the EC Humanitarian Office (ECHO), Goal's main EU donor. ECHO is now likely to call for a full audit of Goal's accounts.
Goal's chairman, Mr Noel Carroll, responded to UCLAF's findings by saying the EU had been "got at". "The Department is out to do us, and they're trying to get Europe on to it." He was "absolutely convinced" that Goal was being "set up" and Goal's director, Mr John O'Shea, "crucified".
Goal yesterday accused the Department of conducting a campaign against it, by suggesting its accounts were incomplete and that it double-claimed for some expenses.
At a press conference before the UCLAF report details emerged, Mr O'Shea claimed the Department may have suspended the agency's funding because of his criticism of official policies. He clashed this year with Department officials and the last government on Irish policy in Rwanda.
In its statement last night the Department said it had "no agenda other than meeting its own responsibility to account for the expenditure of public funds". The Commission source confirmed the EU investigation was sparked by complaints made by former Goal employees in Africa. Goal maintains the EU only became involved when a complaint was made by a Department official. The Commission source said that "when we looked at what we saw, we had no confidence in the book-keeping or accounting". UCLAF officials visited Goal's offices in Dublin on June 16th.
In a letter to The Irish Times on Saturday, a Department spokesman said Goal had sought funding from the Agency for Personal Services Overseas (APSO) for assignments in Angola which had been fully funded by ECHO and "explicitly declared that there was no other source of funding".
Goal normally receives about £1.5 million annually from the Department's aid budget.
