Photo source: Remixed from a photo by Steve Dinn published under a Creative Commons license.

Bev Oda

“It’s like we’re on CSI [Crime Scene Investigation television show] or it’s an investigative forensic thing, asking who put the ‘not’ in. I’d like to know what your issue is. What is your issue?”

Bev Oda, responding in the Foreign Affairs committee to questions from Liberal MP John McKay. December 9, 2010.

Our issue?

Our issue is with the expanse and frequency with which the work of earnest public servants, serving diligently for the good of Canadians and Canada’s endeavours on the international stage, get side-tracked by the seemingly insatiable habit of the Harper Government of politicizing departments and programs.

The Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) is a Canadian aid agency established in 1968 to administer Canada's “Official Development Assistance” (coincidentally, known as “ODA”) program. The agency was initially set up to manage Canadian resources delivered to developing countries in Africa, the Middle East, the Americas, and Asia, and its mandate grew to include “official assistance (OA) programs in Central and Eastern Europe, and the former Soviet Union (countries in transition) by supporting democratic development and economic liberalization.”

CIDA has identified a group of countries of focus (which includes countries in North Africa and the Middle East), and it partners with individual Canadians, Canadian institutions and non-governmental organizations, international agencies, and organizations and representatives within “fragile states and countries in crisis” themselves.

After a number of years working in the private sector communications industry, Beverley Oda was elected as an MP for the Ontario riding of Durham in 2004. In August of 2007, she was appointed Minister for the Canadian International Development Agency.

CIDA aids in a number of areas, including education, environment, health, equality between men and women, humanitarian aid, and private sector development in these countries.

The defunding of KAIROS (Kairos is a greek word referenced in scripture; roughly speaking, it refers to interpreting signs of the times – the kairos – and requires a call to action) is at the heart of the current controversy in which Bev Oda has become a central figure. KAIROS is a faith-based partnership of eleven Canadian churches and organizations (Anglican Church of Canada, Christian Reformed Church in North America, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, The Presbyterian Church in Canada, United Church of Canada, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace, Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Canadian Religious Conference, Mennonite Central Committee of Canada and The Primate's World Relief and Development Fund). This organization “promotes democratic human development and ecological sustainability in some of the world’s poorest countries”.

KAIROS has a long-standing relationship with CIDA, having received funding for the past thirty-five years. On October 27, 2010, the Globe & Mail reported obtaining a memo that indicated civil servants within CIDA had recommended giving KAIROS “more than $7-million over four years. The amount included a 4% increase in funding over previous years ‘to recognize KAIROS' strategic alignment with CIDA's objectives’, the document says. The memo, obtained through the Access to Information Act, includes endorsements from 20 CIDA specialists and Canadian officials posted abroad.”

The document recommending that KAIROS receive $7,098,758 in funding was signed first by Naresh Singh, Assistant Vice-President of the Canadian Partnership Branch of CIDA, on September 25, 2009. On September 27, 2009, Margaret Biggs, President of CIDA, also signed the document, again affirming the funding. Minister Oda signed the document on November 27, 2009, but there remains a cloud over exactly when a now-infamous handwritten, printed, “NOT” appeared on the document, such that the document then read: “RECOMMENDATION — That you sign below to indicate you NOT approve the contribution of $7,098,758 to the above program".

Soon, KAIROS became aware that its funding had been cut. On November 30, 2009, Mary Corkery, Executive Director of KAIROS, wrote to Minister Oda. The Minister replied to Ms. Corkery on December 3, 2009, with general statements about the goals of CIDA, that CIDA was going to “focus our resources both geographically and thematically, on our three priorities of Food Security, Children and Youth, and Economic Growth. Another element is to ensure that all of the projects we support deliver results that make a real difference to the lives of those living in poverty.” Minister Oda did not offer specific reasons as to why the funding to KAIROS had been denied.

The Globe & Mail article of October 27, 2010 goes on to report on the assessment of Stephen Brown, who teaches International Development at the University of Ottawa. He believes that this is a case of politics driving the decision-making of civil servants. Brown says: “All the development experts approved it, then the politician reversed it. It shows it's a political decision and not one based on the merits of the proposal.”

Enter Canada’s Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister, Jason Kenney, who, in a speech in Jerusalem at the Global Forum for Combating Anti-Semitism in December 16, 2009, threw a mini-grenade into the controversy: “We have articulated and implemented a zero tolerance approach to anti-Semitism. What does this mean? It means that we eliminated the government funding relationship with organizations like for example, the Canadian Arab Federation... We have ended government contact with like-minded organizations like the Canadian Islamic Congress...We have defunded organizations, most recently like KAIROS, who are taking a leadership role in the boycott [against Israel].”

Reaction was swift. KAIROS replied that Kenney's statement about its “leadership role” in the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign against Israel is false. KAIROS announced that its 11 member churches and organizations decided back in 2005 against advocating sanctions against Israel, and that “KAIROS developed its own policy, independently of others. This policy states that ‘KAIROS does not recommend a general boycott of Israeli goods for a number of reasons,” and that “KAIROS not support any use of sanctions against Israel.”

A few months later in March, 2010, Minister Oda’s Parliamentary Secretary, Conservative MP, Jim Abbott, told the House of Commons that CIDA "determined, with regret, that [KAIROS] did not meet the agency’s current priorities.”

So, which is it? The activities of KAIROS just don’t fit in with the government’s objectives? Or, KAIROS is being punished for some perceived wrongdoing?

On December 9, 2010, the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development called upon CIDA President, Margaret Biggs to answer questions. Ms. Biggs, when asked if she was the individual who wrote the “^NOT” in the funding recommendation, replied that she did not write the “^NOT” and she didn’t know who did.

It was Minister Bev Oda’s turn to answer questions:

"You were the one who wrote the 'not,'" Liberal committee member John McKay put forward.

"I did not say I was the one who wrote the 'not,'" Ms. Oda replied.

"Who did then?" Mr. McKay asked.

"I do not know," Ms. Oda replied.

That evoked a stunned silence in the West Block committee room before Mr. McKay said: "That's a remarkable statement."

Bloc Québécois member Jean Dorion followed by asking Ms. Biggs whether the "NOT" was on the document when she signed it.

"No, it wasn't, sir," the CIDA president replied, acknowledging that the agency did recommend the KAIROS proposal.”

[in addition to the Embassy Magazine coverage quoted above, also see this link for the full report: http://www2.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?DocId=4966042&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=40&Ses=3&File=12]

To be clear, Minister Oda was not being contrite in that sombre December meeting. Rather, it could be said that she was actually dismissive of her questioners. That is when she glibly offered the CSI reference (“It’s like we’re on CSI or it’s an investigative forensic thing, asking who put the ‘not’ in”).

In Ottawa there is the expectation — nay, in fact an obligation — that people appearing before committees will be entirely truthful. So, once Parliament resumed on February 10, 2011, Peter Milliken, Speaker of the House, admonished Minister Oda for what he termed “a ‘very troubling’ case that made senior civil servants appear to have signed a doctored document.”

“Any reasonable person confronted with what appears to have transpired would necessarily be extremely concerned, if not shocked, and might well begin to doubt the integrity of certain decision-making processes,” said the Speaker. “In particular, the senior CIDA officials concerned must be deeply disturbed by the doctored document they have been made to appear to have signed.”

Now, do you remember the statement above that notes the expectation of honesty in committee meetings?

On February 14, 2011, Bev Oda stood up in Parliament and recanted the information she had provided to the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development in December. “The ‘not’ was inserted at my direction,” Ms. Oda said Monday in the House of Commons. “Given the way the document was formatted … this was the only way to reflect my decision.”

Bev Oda’s only defence was that ministers are entirely within their rights to override the recommendations of public servants. (Others say, and we agree, that it is really hard to believe that the only option Ms. Oda had in refuting the recommendation of the CIDA officials was to sign the document and insert a ^NOT in the recommendation. Really. If she disagreed with the recommendation to fund, she would have, should have, simply not signed it in the first place!)

However, many people wonder if the “^NOT” really was inserted at Minister Oda’s direction. There is wide speculation that the final decision on funding was actually made by the Prime Minister or the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). It is possible that Minister Oda initially approved the funding by signing the recommendation and then later instructed a staffer to add the “^NOT” after being told to reverse her decision.

This theory is supported by the fact that in the days following Oda’s new admission that the “^NOT” was inserted at her direction, not a single question asked by opposition members in the House of Commons directed towards Minister Bev Oda was answered by the Minister herself; rather, all were fielded by Government House Leader, John Baird!

In an article written on February 15, 2011, John Ivison of the National Post worried about the shadow this case casts on our Canadian democracy. He wrote, “The only way that Ms. Oda’s memory loss makes sense is if the doctored document was ordered from on high.... The mistake the Conservatives made was to try to fudge who was having [the KAIROS] funding cut and why.”

In a 6-4 vote in late February, 2011, members of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development asked Speaker Milliken to consider whether Minister Oda has breached the rules of Parliament, in which case she could be found to be in contempt.

The Bev Oda scandal, like so many of the indignities imposed on Canadian political life by the Harper Government, is fluid and has yet to be resolved.

Contempt for Canada’s most hallowed institution – Parliament – has, rather than being the exception, appeared to be the norm for the Harper Government!

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