Halliburton staff tell Congress about spending

WASHINGTON – Mike West arrived in Iraq last September as a labor supervisor, one of legions of workers hired by oil services giant Halliburton Co. to help rebuild the battered country. And at his boss’s direction, West filled out timecards saying that he worked 12-hour days, seven days a week, in camps with evocative names such as Anaconda and Al Asad.

But over the next two months, West said Monday, he probably put in no more than a week’s worth of labor. The rest of the time, West and others hired by the company loafed, read books and grew frustrated about the lack of work, he said.

When he complained about the apparent waste, West said, he was told not to worry about costs: Halliburton would make a profit no matter what happened. “I really saw no purpose for us being there,” West said. “I don’t know why Halliburton was hiring all these people.”

West is among six contract workers who recently told members of the House Committee on Government Reform they witnessed examples of misspending and mismanagement by Halliburton subsidiary KBR while serving overseas. They described how $85,000 trucks had been abandoned on roadsides in Iraq for minor problems, such as flat tires, or driven into the ground because of a lack of basic maintenance.

Details about the workers’ claims came to light Monday in a letter from Rep. Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., the committee’s senior Democrat, to Rep. Thomas M. Davis III, R-Va., the chairman, objecting to Davis’s decision not to include the workers’ testimony in a hearing Tuesday about contracting in Iraq.

Halliburton spokeswoman Wendy Hall said in an e-mail: “We take any charges of improper conduct seriously. … We will look into these assertions. If issues arise, we are committed to addressing them forthrightly and openly.”