Coalition appoints new Executive Director for Coordination Unit 'ACU'

The National Coalition appointed Mr. Asaad al-Achi as its executive director of Assistant Coordination Unit (ACU) on Wednesday, source said.

Al-Achi, 34, based in Scotland, is a Western-educated accountant and  financial analyst.

The former ACU executive director, Dr. Osama Kadi, resigned after months of ‘skirmishes’ with controversial head Suhair Atassi.

Last month, Atassi filed a complaint against Kadi over accusations of abusing the Unit rules.

Kadi, in phone-call statement to Zaman, said the amount of aids last month has exceeded what has been distributed for the whole last year, assuring implement high standards of accountability  

While ago, Atassi said in statement obtained by Zaman Alwasl that she can not afford the repeated insults by Kadi.

The controversial head of ACU accused Kadi of monopolizing everything from his residence in Dubai, according to the complaint.

“Kadi is detrimental to the Unit's work, even many donations have been stopped in result to a paper he presented individually in the donors conference,” Atassi said.

Kadi, was appointed by Coalition leader Ahmed Jarba last December in response to activists’ demands to find solution to the deteriorating situation of the Unit as well the conflict of interests.

Last November, 25 members of the ACU’s staff went on strike, claiming concerns over mismanagement of aid delivery and funding that they say have gone unaddressed by Atassi.

Former employees who quit the ACU told The Daily Star on December they had concerns about a “conflict of interest” between her political role with the coalition and the ACU. While the coalition established the ACU, the aid body is supposedly independent of all political organizations.