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roachboy · 05-17-2007, 05:53 PM

there's probably little reason to post this as i am sure it is well-known by now...mostly, i think doing it is a bit therapeutic:

Quote:

May 17, 2007
Wolfowitz to Resign From World Bank
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN

WASHINGTON, May 17 ? Paul D. Wolfowitz this evening ended weeks of furor over charges of favoritism toward a bank employee who is his female companion and announced his resignation as president of the World Bank, effective June 30.

The bank board backed away from threats to force Mr. Wolfowitz to resign for violating his contract, as a special investigative committee had concluded, and instead accepted his claim that his actions were honorably intended.

The resignation brought a dramatic conclusion to two days of negotiations between Mr. Wolfowitz and the bank board, which went along with his demands for an exoneration of the charges that he had broken ethics and governance rules in arranging for a generous pay and promotion package for Shaha Ali Riza, his girlfriend, in 2005.

?He assured us that he acted ethically and in good faith in what he believed were the best interests of the institution, and we accept that,? the board?s directors said. ?We also accept that others involved acted ethically and in good faith.?

In a carefully negotiated statement, the board praised Mr. Wolfowitz for his two years of service at the bank, and especially for his work in arranging for debt relief and pressing for more assistance to poor countries, especially in Africa, and also combating corruption, which was Mr. Wolfowitz?s signature issue.

Mr. Wolfowitz said he was grateful for the directors? decision and, referring to the bank?s mission of helping the world?s poor, added: ?Now it is necessary to find a way to move forward. To do that I have concluded that it is in the best interests of those whom this institution serves for that mission to be carried forward under new leadership.?

Though Mr. Wolfowitz?s resignation is effective June 30, people close to the negotiations said he agreed not to make major personnel or policy decisions. Some bank officials said he might go on an administrative leave and cede day-to-day functions to an acting leader, but that may not be decided until Friday.

President Bush had earlier in the day praised Mr. Wolfowitz at a news conference but signaled that the end was near by saying he regretted ?that it?s come to this.?

A White House spokesman, Tony Fratto, said this evening: ?We would have preferred that he stay at the bank, but the president reluctantly accepts his decision.?

More important for the bank?s future, Mr. Fratto said President Bush would soon announce a candidate to succeed Mr. Wolfowitz, quashing speculation that the United States would go along with an end to the custom, in effect since the 1940s, of the American president picking the bank president.

Many European officials had previously indicated that they would go along with the United States? picking a successor if Mr. Wolfowitz would resign voluntarily, as he now has.

Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. said this evening that he would ?consult my colleagues around the world? before recommending a choice to Mr. Bush. This was an apparent effort to assure European allies that the United States would not repeat what happened in 2005 when Mr. Bush surprised European allies in naming Mr. Wolfowitz, then a deputy secretary of defense and an architect of the Iraq war.

Leaders of Germany and France objected but decided not to make a fight over the choice, reopening wounds from their opposition to the Iraq war two years earlier. Some also argued that Mr. Wolfowitz, as a conservative seeking to write a new chapter in a career that until 2005 had been focused on national security, might bring new support to aiding the world?s poor.

Soon after Mr. Wolfowitz took office, however, he engaged in fights with various fiefdoms at the bank over many issues, particularly his campaign against corruption, in which he suspended aid to several countries without consulting board members, and his reliance on a small group of aides.

Mr. Wolfowitz?s resignation, while ending the turmoil that erupted in early April over the disclosure of his role in arranging Ms. Riza?s pay and promotion package, will not by itself repair the divisions at the bank over his leadership, bank officials said this evening.

By all accounts, the terms of Mr. Wolfowitz?s exoneration left a bitter taste with most of the 24 board members, who represent major donor countries, as well as clusters of smaller donor and recipient countries. Most had wanted to adopt the findings of a special board committee that he had acted unethically on the matter of Ms. Riza.

But the closest the board came to criticizing Mr. Wolfowitz was in its carefully worded statement that ?a number of mistakes were made by a number of individuals in handling the matter under consideration and that the bank?s systems did not prove robust to the strain under which they were placed.?

Also angered was the bank?s staff association, which had called for Mr. Wolfowitz?s resignation in early April. The bank?s internal blogs were lit up with denunciations of the action this evening.

During the day, as word spread throughout the institution that Mr. Wolfowitz was close to a deal, some officials said that one of the hang-ups was his compensation package. But there was no information tonight on whether he would receive any sort of severance package or pension, or be reimbursed for legal fees from his long battle.

Mr. Wolfowitz?s salary was $302,470 as of 2004 ? with the bank paying any taxes on that sum ? and $141,290 in expenses. His contract calls for him to be paid a year?s salary if he is terminated, but it was unclear whether his resignation would be considered a termination as defined by the contract.

The sense that his term was coming to an end permeated the bank and was being discussed in finance and development ministries throughout the world.

The resignation came after Mr. Bush, at a Rose Garden news conference with Tony Blair, the British Prime Minister, who was paying his last official visit to the White House before leaving office this summer, spoke in the past tense of Mr. Wolfowitz?s record in helping the poor.

The irony of those comments, in the presence of Mr. Blair, is that a British member of the World Bank?s board, Thomas Scholar, had recently taken the lead in negotiating with Mr. Wolfowitz?s lawyer, Robert S. Bennett, over the president?s exit.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/17/wo...hp&oref=slogin