Maravi

Failing to address serious issues

Failing to address serious issues
Written by Editor

WHEN State House announced that President Rupiah Banda was going to hold his second press conference, the country was all of a sudden held spellbound with expectations.

It was clear that everything was not well in the country and the people looked to Rupiah, hoping that on Wednesday - the day of the press conference - he would tell the nation that he had changed his approach in the running of this country.

The expectations were high in the nation, from the man on the street to an executive in the office. We are actually told that in anticipation of Rupiah's press conference, some players in the money market were speculating highly to an extent where they were even slowing down their participation.

A number of stakeholders in the country outlined what they expected Rupiah to attend to during his press conference.

The nation was highly hopeful that come Wednesday, all the striking nurses would get back to the hospitals as they expected Rupiah to address the strike action in a very convincing way. But what did the nation get? Rupiah decided to treat the nation to comedy and explained how he ended up having a massage on his knee in South Africa since the health workers in Zambia were on strike.

Due to the attitude and character that Rupiah exhibited on Wednesday, even his health minister Kapembwa Simbao decided to take a confrontational approach towards the health workers, threatening them with dismissals if they do not report for work today.

Instead of addressing the many issues that people expected him to look at, Rupiah decided to take the country for a ride.

Rupiah's failure to inspire the nation is now clear. Transparency International Zambia (TIZ) president Reuben Lifuka describes the press conference as being partly presidential and political because in the first part, Rupiah tried to deal with national issues and in the second part he used the ocassion to lampoon the opposition political party leaders and The Post.

Lifuka says they had hoped that the President would this time round clearly articulate strategic measures that will holistically address the problem of corruption especially in light of glaring exposes in some government ministries as well as bringing finality to the on-going strike in the health sector.

This is the disappointment, Rupiah's failure to take national issues seriously. At a time when the nation hoped to count on him to bring about change, his press conference has dashed the hopes of our people. Rupiah has simply brought hopelessness in our people.

History tells us that in times of problems people have always looked to their leaders for deliverance. One of the attributes of good leadership is being able to set a good example and making a difference in people's lives. But for Rupiah, he decided to lecture our government workers on how they should reduce their foreign travel when he is at the forefront of travelling abroad - kamwendo munjila.

Rupiah decided to lecture the nation on the case of education minister Dora Siliya as if people had not even read judge Phillip Musonda's judgment which clearly stated that the rest of the findings remained as observed by the tribunal save for the issue of breaching the Republican Constitution. Rupiah went as far as showing the nation how much he was hurt by the Siliya case by attacking William Harrington just because he was one of the persons who lodged a complaint against the education minister.

Rupiah's failure to inspire the nation should be an indication that all is not well and he needs to take another approach. He needs to bring a sense of hope in our people and not hopelessness. There are many serious matters such as the fight against corruption in our country that require his attention, instead of the less important issues that he seems to put first.

We have always said that in any society, corruption is a major obstacle in the path to development and should be fought at all costs. And we agree with TIZ that it would have been appropriate to learn from Rupiah on the overall government strategy on developing an appropriate institutional framework for fighting corruption - a framework that considers not just the Anti Corruption Commission but other important players like the Zambia Police Service, DEC and the Auditor General's office.

This strategy is missing. Rupiah took time to talk about the establishment of a Serious Fraud Unit within the Anti-Corruption Commission, as well as the creation of a Financial Intelligence Unit and the decision to extend forensic audits to other government ministries. The idea is welcome but forming committees, sub-committees and units to fight corruption and other financial-related crimes will not solve the current problem of corruption in the country if there is no proper political will by those tasked to preside over public affairs.

How does the government expect to properly fund these units when the already- existing units that are tasked to fight corruption and other crimes are under-funded? Lip-service will not help Rupiah especially on the fight against corruption and the observations from donors on abuse of their taxpayers' money should be warning enough. The suspension of aid to the Ministry of Health by some donor countries should be enough wake-up call for Rupiah and his friends to make things right. Yes, they might want to say that the alleged thefts started years back but they were still in government at the time.

The lame excuse of just being in office for eight months will not hold water. We have seen change in certain countries where leaders have made serious decisions in a few days of being in the presidency - US President Barack Obama is one clear example. Rupiah is now in charge and cannot continue to pass the buck. He just needs to clean the mess.

We have always said that corruption is intrinsically linked to underdevelopment and affects people's lives in many ways. Corruption is destructive to society because money meant for delivery of social services for people is normally diverted for private gain. This vice leaves people without, for instance, proper health services and infrastructure in that money meant to procure drugs for patients or to improve hospitals would have been diverted, thus threatening the lives of people. In worst case scenarios, this ill trend costs lives.

Corruption should never be tolerated because it is a major obstacle to democracy and the rule of law because institutions lose their legitimacy when they are misused for personal gains. Under a corrupt system of governance, the social fabric is greatly affected because people tend to lose their trust in political systems, in institutions and the leadership. This in most cases leads to disillusionment and frustration among the governed and the stakeholders.

There is need for Rupiah and his friends to take the fight against corruption seriously because this vice is capable of reversing all the gains that the country has made. Corruption thrives in the absence of institutional checks on power, in the absence of transparency in decision making, in the absence of a strong and militant civil society, in the absence of equality in wealth distribution.

Our political leaders need to understand that they are accountable to the people who elect them, they are not their own masters. The power that our people entrust in political leaders should be used for the benefit of society and not for the personal benefit of the individual who holds it. It becomes a source of worry when people misuse publicly entrusted power for private gain. There is need to place control measures to prevent people from abusing their power, to prevent people from stealing public resources.

An economy that is undermined by corruption has the potential of discouraging foreign investment and donors. A clear case is the suspension of funds to the Ministry of Health following revelations of corruption. The donors made it very clear that it was unacceptable to abuse their taxpayers' money. The consequences of this withdrawal are grave and one can only imagine how this sector which thrives on 55 per cent donor funding will survive if that is not reversed. But we all know that our country needs to attract a flow of money for it to develop.

As we have always said, corruption should be fought on grounds that we are all convinced that it is a terrible vice which needs to be uprooted to ensure political and economic progress in our country. You cannot claim to fight corruption when all your dealings are questionable and always shrouded in secrecy. You cannot claim to fight corruption when those surrounding you are shielded even when guilty of wrongdoing. You cannot claim to fight corruption if on one hand you are secretly perpetuating it. We have always said that no one is above the law and we support any genuine efforts towards curbing corruption.

It is possible to reduce corruption to manageable levels and even eradicate it completely if we all work together, if we promote the culture of honesty, transparency and accountability.

Labels: RUPIAH BANDA

posted by MrK @ 1:54 PM