U.S. envoy asks Trump administration to back Adesina’s re-election

AfDB sanctions Danish firm for corruption

Former United States representative at the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Mima Nedelcovych, wants the Donald Trump administration to back Akinwumi Adesina for re-election as AfDB president. Nedelcovych served as the U.S. Executive Director at the AfDB from 1989 to 1993.

In an interview with Pan African Visions, Nedelcovych argued that unless the U.S. government was holding some secret that the American public was not aware of, “I see absolutely no reason it should not wholeheartedly support the re-election of Adesina at the helm of the African Development Bank.

“If competing with the Chinese in Africa is primordial to the U.S., then supporting the position of our African fellow shareholders in the AfDB and supporting Adesina is in our own interests.”

On May 29, the first U.S. Executive Director at the bank, Amb. Harold Doley, sent a letter to the Trump administration to back Adesina. Both men have now said that backing Adesina is in the best interest of the U.S.

According to Nedelcovych, Adesina has established the framework for furthering the critically important role the AfDB is playing in the development and inclusive growth of the continent.

With his vision and execution of the “High 5s” for Africa, Adesina has contributed tremendously to the development of the continent, President Olusegun Obasanjo and other former African presidents have every reason to come out in public in support of the champion that the current AfDB president is, Nedelcovych added.

On the whistleblower allegations that triggered the current tension among AfDB partners, Nedelcovych said the internal inquiry did its job fully in line with statutory guidelines.

Meanwhile, AfDB has announced the debarment of Burmeister & Wain, a Scandinavian contractor, for 21 months, for engaging in sharp practices in a power generation project financed by the bank in Mauritius.

The Scandinavian Countries’ Board members on the AfDB Board of Governors are believed to be part of the non-African Shareholders of the bank supporting the insistence of U.S on a second investigation of spurious allegations of unethical practices levelled against Adesina by a whistleblower.

The AfDB Board of Governors has since given its president a clean bill of health of all the allegations, clearing the way for him to go for the second tenure contest in August. Dr. Adesina is running unchallenged.

With the debarment, the company is now ineligible to participate in all development finance institutions’ projects around the globe, pursuant to an agreement entered into by all Development Finance Institutions, including the AfDB and World Bank.