The leaders of a small U.S. aid agency focused on African development have been accused of mismanagement, misuse of official funds, and fraudulent and corrupt spending practices, according to interviews with former agency employees and a trove of internal documents and two letters from U.S. lawmakers obtained by Foreign Policy.
The leaders of a small U.S. aid agency focused on African development have been accused of mismanagement, misuse of official funds, and fraudulent and corrupt spending practices, according to interviews with former agency employees and a trove of internal documents and two letters from U.S. lawmakers obtained by Foreign Policy.
Two U.S. lawmakers have leveled the allegations of waste, fraud, and abuse at the U.S. African Development Foundation (USADF), a small federal aid agency that invests directly in African businesses and development projects.
Sens. Jim Risch and Tim Scott in late January sent a letter to the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), an independent government watchdog, urging a federal investigation into the USADF. They urged the GAO to investigate “misuse of official funds; fraudulent spending and record keeping; conflicts of interest among USADF management, board members, and private-sector/non-governmental partners; gross mismanagement” and “inappropriate, abusive, and discriminatory management practices” as well as “management efforts to suppress evidence of wrongdoing,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by Foreign Policy.
Risch and Scott, both Republicans, are members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which oversees U.S. diplomatic and aid agencies.
Risch sent a letter to the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Office of Inspector General (USAID OIG) in November 2023, urging a separate USAID investigation into the small aid agency.
When approached for comment on the letters, a spokesperson for USADF said that the agency was “not at liberty to comment on an ongoing investigation” but was cooperating “fully” and was “confident that this matter will be resolved.”
“We are proud of the unprecedented achievements of our agency over the past several years, and point all who are interested toward the publicly available data on our track record of fiscal oversight, our internal work environment, and our development impacts in Africa,” the spokesperson added, citing the impact of USADF’s work in its annual report as well as federal employee survey data for the agency, conducted in the summer of 2023, that found an “employee experience index” of 85 percent.
A USAID OIG audit of USADF’s finances for fiscal years 2022 and 2023, performed by accounting firm Williams Adley, found that USADF’s financial statements were “presented fairly” and found “no material weaknesses in internal control over financial reporting based on the limited procedures we performed.”
USADF is currently led by CEO Travis Adkins, a Biden administration appointee who is an expert on U.S.-Africa relations. Adkins previously served as deputy assistant USAID administrator for Africa and is a lecturer on African and security studies at Georgetown University.
The aid agency, founded in 1980, is aimed at investing in African entrepreneurs and small- and medium-sized businesses, providing grants of up to $250,000 to grow African enterprises. By the standards of U.S. federal agencies, USADF is small, with a staff of under 60 and a fiscal year 2024 budget request of $46 million.
In their letter, Risch and Scott say Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff received “whistleblower complaints from individuals with first-hand knowledge of the allegations” of waste, fraud, and abuse by USADF leadership.
Foreign Policy interviewed several former USADF officials who corroborated the allegations outlined in the lawmakers’ letter. Those former officials spoke on condition of anonymity, citing fears of reprisal and harm to their professional reputations.
In his November letter to the USAID inspector general, Risch, citing whistleblowers who spoke with Senate Foreign Relations Committee staffers, alleged that USADF “directed federal funding to organizations with close personal ties to USADF officials and board members, thereby creating inappropriate conflicts of interest.”
Risch also said the committee received “multiple, credible reports of discriminatory hiring practices” and “mistreatment of protected classes,” writing that “[w]itnesses cite multiple instances in which members of USADF’s senior leadership have used degrading language toward women, actively sought to exclude veterans and individuals who are not of African descent from hiring, and retaliated against employees who dared raise questions about the misuse of official funds.”
Risch in his letter told USAID OIG general counsel Nicole Angarella that he believed several of the allegations that his committee investigation found “may constitute violations of federal law.”
A spokesperson for the USAID OIG acknowledged that the office received Risch’s letter but declined to comment on the existence of a specific open investigation. A GAO spokesperson said it received Risch and Scott’s separate letter to start an investigation but also declined to comment further.
