OLAF: just another plate of Offal?

The aim of the European Anti-Fraud Office (Office Europeen de Lutte Anti-Fraude: OLAF) is to protect the interests of the European Union, to fight fraud, corruption and any other irregular activity, including misconduct within the European Institutions, but does it? Sean Holohan , Director, Protiviti and Peter Kallo , a consultant with the firm, investigate.

Sean Holohan may be contacted on tel: +44 (0) 20 7930 8808; email: s.holohan@protiviti.co.uk

OLAF was born out of the previous, doomed agency (Unité de Coordination de la Lutte Anti-Fraude: UCLAF) in 1999. UCLAF had never been a fraud-busting unit or even an internal audit service; it was merely a coordinator of allegations of fraud for the benefit of national prosecutors in member states. UCLAF was not even allowed to pursue active fraud investigations and The Hon. Mr Charles Wardle [1] (member of the Public Accounts Committee) went as far to describe the entire UCLAF operation as a “farce”. Even OLAF later admitted, “UCLAF had neither the tools nor the legal bases for such a task” [2]. After the Van Buitenen affair, in which many members of the European Commission were forced to resign, it was decided to reform UCLAF, and thus OLAF came into being.