WP,pg1: Much Undone In Rebuilding Iraq (as handover to Iraqis begins)

[DeepModem Mom]

Much Undone In Rebuilding Iraq, Audit Says
By Andy Mosher and Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, August 2, 2006; Page A01

NASIRIYAH, Iraq, Aug. 1 -- A flailing Iraq reconstruction effort that has been dominated for more than three years by U.S. dollars and companies is being transferred to Iraqis, leaving them the challenge of completing a long list of projects left unfinished by the Americans.

While the handover is occurring gradually, it comes as U.S. money dwindles and American officials face a Sept. 30 deadline for choosing which projects to fund with the remaining $2 billion of the $21 billion rebuilding program. More than 500 planned projects have not been started, and the United States lacks a coherent plan for transferring authority to Iraqi control, a report released Tuesday concludes.

In some cases, Iraqis are having to take over projects from American construction firms that were removed from jobs because of poor performance. For example, in Nasiriyah, about 300 miles southeast of Baghdad, the Iraqi firm Al-Basheer Co. was recently given a prison-construction contract that a huge American conglomerate, Parsons Global Services Inc., lost. Parsons was six months overdue with the project and had completed only a third of the job.

"This is the fourth quarter" of the U.S.-led reconstruction, said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, whose office is issuing the report. "The Iraqis are going to have to develop their own system."

As the handoff proceeds, there are questions about exactly what it is the Iraqis will inherit and how a government plagued by corruption can restore confidence in a rebuilding program that has been dogged by corruption allegations from the start....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/01/AR2006080101453.html

[MadMaddie]

1. Once again the Iraquis....are screwed.....

they are going to get handed over a construction mess....they would be better starting over with new construction and destroying what Bechtel started....

[ShockediSay]

2. "how a government plagued by corruption can restore confidence"

errrr, which government are we talking about?

Or, at this point, does it really matter?