Pascal Odoch
22 September 2008
opinion
A young person who dishes out some incredible cash or pledge, say one million shillings or more, at a burial or tithe in a house of worship, instantly becomes "Mzee." The Kiswahili word widely refers to a mature or senior citizen.
On average such a person has cumulative work experience (formal or informal), has wisdom, is an opinion leader, is a retired public officer, living on pension in dignity and pride. Now here is a country where we are prompted to accord prestige to an under 30-year-old youth who has some kind of money and instantly earns himself the prestigious title in Ugandan society. We even congratulate and condone corruption when we get a lift in a car bought by a corrupt person by highly appreciating how they have relieved us from doing the great trek.
We even thank them for the mchomo and buzz they offer us after an exhaustive long day. Conversely, when you work in public service and retire without a car or a house to live in, your social standing in society may be questioned. Society is likely to call you Mzee reluctantly.
The Uganda National Commission Report on Africa Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) 2007 assesses Uganda's governance. The report identifies corruption as an activity that involves use of public position for private gain- embezzlement, nepotism, over-invoicing, bribes, bid rigging etc. But can any of these illegal activities be executed by an officer in isolation of others?
The most cited factors contributing to corruption are the lack of a clear understanding of the roles of the anti-corruption institutions such as the Inspector General of Government or existing pieces of legislations or code of conduct such as the Leadership Code; Access to Information Act, etc. Even in sale of land somehow the LCI chairman of the area and the neighbours to the land being sold have to be aware of such transactions.
But nobody is talking about our moral fibre. In late 1998, I was in Switzerland with a Canadian graduate student colleague to an international seminar. The fellow lost his wallet and the next thing it was at the Police Station with all belongings with the 140 Canadian dollars intact. That is a morally astute society. In Uganda, I have not come across a "lost and found" section in public places be it at Mulago, Taxi Park, or temples.
This simply show how Ugandans don't care for each other. My niece lost her mobile phone as she was getting out after church service. In Kampala, you forget your umbrella in a taxi or at a restaurant and quickly rush back to trace it you could be beaten up for blackmail.
When villagers sell their crop harvests or livestock and travel to Kampala to purchase a couple of items, we simply intimidate them and even grab their money under the pretext of having stolen our shop items; sometimes they end up at police or Mulago Hospital because of thorough beating. The story goes on and on.
The reason why corruption is growing in Uganda is because we are not holistic in tackling it. We think it is only a matter found in the public sector with about 300,000 employees. What about the rest of the 31 million Ugandans who are not public officers? We are not focusing on the civil society. We are not looking at the private sector.
We are not looking at the traditional/cultural institutions. These domains all require strategies that can reach them in equal measure to what we have aggressively done to the public sector.
Dr Odoch is a rural development specialist and a member of the Daily Monitor Panel of Experts
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