State Department inspector general issues alert over $6 billion in contracting money

[KoKo]

2. Pvt. Chelsea Manning Credited! This is a shocking report on State Dept. More:

Linick initiated the alert format to report on problems that remain unaddressed despite repeatedly being identified in IG audits and investigations. The first alert, released in January in partly classified form, cited “significant and recurring weaknesses in the Department of State Information System Security Program.”

Issued three years after the public release of hundreds of thousands of department cables, which then-Army Pvt. Bradley Manning had turned over to WikiLeaks, the first alert found that efforts to find and fix the problems had been insufficient.

The new alert addressed a similarly sensitive issue: the government’s inability to keep track of the growing number of outside contractors who have taken the place of government workers. A series of special government and congressional investigations has identified widespread contracting fraud in both the State and Defense departments, especially in overseas expenditures.

A succession of IG audits, investigations and inspections, the report said, found “repeated examples of poor contract file administration.” Among the examples it cited was a recent audit of the “closeout process for contracts supporting the U.S. mission in Iraq.” When auditors asked for a sample of 115 contract files, officials were unable to provide 33 of them, totaling $2.1 billion. Of the remaining 82, the report said, 48 contained insufficient documents required by federal law.

During an ongoing audit of State’s Bureau of African Affairs, the report said, officials did not provide complete files for any of the eight contracts reviewed, with a value of $34.8 million.
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Whole article is well worth the read!