KABUL (Pajhwok): Former Afghan ambassador to Washington has been accused of corruption while information available shows that $30,000 was paid for her salary, insurance, house rent and other expenses.
Some sources claim that more than $2,300 was paid to RoyaRahmani and other diplomats at the Afghan embassy in the US for their hospitality expenses, but Rahmani spent the money privately and paid $800 to her cleaner as monthly salary, whose real salary was $3080.
Pajhwok shared these issues with former Afghan ambassador to Washington, RoyaRehmani, some officials as well as former officials of the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but no one has given an official response so far.
Salary:
Pajhwok has obtained financial details about the salary of Rahmani that revealed the former envoy received an amount of $21,894 in salary for the first three months of 2019 fiscal year. The amount of money shows that Rahmani’s monthly salary was $7,298 at the time.
However, based on a letter from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent to the embassy on April 25, 2019, the salaries of the embassy staff, including the ambassador, had been increased by 10 percent. The ambassador’s salary was increased by $730 considering the amount of her salary.
A source told Pajhwok that RoyaRahmani had recently been given a rank promotion which increased her salary by another $600 and the total amount of her salary reached $8,628.
Insurance:
The insurance agreement of Afghan employees at the Afghan embassy in Washington had been signed with a company named Aetna. Six of the 15 employees were individually insured, two were couples and seven were a whole family that also included children. The total amount of insurance money of these people reached $328,354.
Under the agreement, the monthly insurance for individual employees was $733, for the couples it was $2,064 and for the family it was $2,413.
The source says that RoyaRahmani was one of the five people whose entire family was insured and was paid $2,413 for insurance.
Rahmani paid $800 instead of $3,080 to her house cleaner:
Based on the list of salaries for Afghan employees in the embassy for the first three months of 2019 Afghan fiscal year, the salary of Camisnar Sarmo, a woman who was hired as cleaner, had a salary of $2,800 which had increased to $3,080 considering the 10 percent increment.
A source at the Afghan embassy in Washington said the woman was a servant at the ambassador’s house and was caring for her daughter.
Another source, who did not want to be named, said that RoyaRahmani had invited CamisnarSarmo from Indonesia and Rahmani paid her $800 as monthly salary where her real monthly salary was $3,080.
Pajhwok tried to talk to the woman, but could not reach her.
Javed Safi, a member of Finance and Budget Commission of former government’s lower house, had traveled to the US on August 28 last year for investigating a Pajhwok report about corruption in construction of the Afghan embassy wall in Washington.
Safi shared his findings with the commission on corruption in the project on October 22 last year and he had said, “RoyaRahmani has in some cases committed acts similar to human trafficking. For example, inviting a woman from Indonesia to the United States as a house cleaner, whose salary was set $3,075 but she was paid only $800 a month. Rahmani charged the visa money and house rent on the woman while the rest of the money was taken by Rahmani, the house where the woman lived belonged to the Afghan government.
Of three, two drivers were in Roya’s service:
The document shows that the embassy had three drivers and a source in the embassy said that two of the three drivers were in the service of the ambassador and each of their salary was $5,200.
The source said that one of the drivers was in service of RoyaRahmani’s daughter and the other was in the service of the ambassador and the third was in the service of the embassy related activities.
The source said that $1,800 was paid to RoyaRahmani’s gardener and $780 was paid for cleanness of a pool in her house every month.
Claim: Ambassador spent hospitality money for personal use
The source said, “The ambassador was given $1,233 for the expenses of hospitality which should be used in the formal meetings, but she received it in cash and spent it for her personal use.”
The source said that the ambassador did not have the right to withdraw cash, but if she needed it, she had to submit a bill of withdrawal to the embassy which she did not do so.
A cheque of the Afghan embassy in Washington shows that the ambassador has withdrawn $3,700 in cash.
The source added that $2,210 a month was also given to the embassy for hospitality of all the diplomats of the embassy but this money was also spent by the ambassador personally.
A former diplomat at the embassy, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that he had worked at the embassy for three years, but had only been paid once his monthly hospitality.
The source added that the ambassador received up to $7,000 per month from the embassy for her house electricity, internet, telephone bills, food, drink, clothing and other expenses.
Another source at the embassy also confirmed these expenses made by the ambassador.
Rahmani rented her house twice as high as the other diplomats:
The Afghan embassy in Washington sent a letter to the Afghan foreign ministry on July 1, 2019. The letter states that the five-month rent of the ambassador’s house amounted to $42,500. The letter asked the foreign ministry to send the money and the next year’s rent to the embassy.
Finance department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote in response to the letter that it had sent a one-year rent of $102,000 to the embassy’s bank account for the rent of ambassador’s house on July 9.
The source said Rahmani had rented a house two to three kilometers away from the Afghan embassy in Washington for $8,500 month, while other diplomats in the same area had rented houses for $2,500 to $3,500 a month.
JavedSafi said Rahmani had misused and personally used the resources of the embassy for escaping prosecution and interrogation about her spending.
Documents from the embassy show that the ambassador was receiving tens of thousands of US dollars each month illegally under different excuses from the finance of the embassy in addition to her monthly salary.
According to a Pajhwok report, the Wolesi Jirga’s Justice and Judicial Affairs Commission, introduced RoyaRahmani to prosecution after a Pajhwok Afghan News report about corruption in the construction of Afghan embassy wall in Washington.
Embassy and foreign ministry are silent on this issue:
Pajhwok has previously shared the issues with the former Afghan ambassador to Washington, the embassy’s press attaché Syed NajibHashimi and some other officials of the previous government, but none of them responded.
Some officials of the embassy say that Rahmani had taken the authority from the central government not to allow any diplomat to share information with the media, particularly Pajhwok Afghan News.
Pajhwok had earlier registered an access to information forum on the issue, but no response was received.
This comes as Access to Information Commission in a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs during the previous administration had asked for sharing information about the issue.
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