• Home
• Video
• Books by Ikram Sehgal
• About

The Corruption Syndrome

From time to time, various exhortations are made from diverse pulpits against the disease of corruption. One of the inherent premises of democracy is that this evil is subject to public scrutiny and therefore effective check. There is no denying the fact that Martial Laws, ostensibly meant to eradicate corruption, end up (because of their longevity) having a Catch-22 effect due to the muzzling of the Press, which in turn makes for a corrupt society, malfeasance having ample opportunity to flourish under an imposed cloak of silence. Now that democracy has been found to be alive and well and living in Pakistan, it is time to turn to accountability in the real sense, not as an end for purposes of political revenge, but to ensure that exposure and punishments work as an effective means of deterrent for the potentially corrupt. The media has to play a responsible and effective role in this process.

Corruption is widespread and endemic today in the body administration. It varies in different individuals and ministries/departments directly proportional to the authority vested in an individual and ministries/department by a regulatory government. The more the regulation, the greater the opportunity for corruption. From time to time some poor peon, clerk or Head Constable runs afoul of the powers-that-be and the system delivers a sacrificial lamb for the record (and the media generously responds in the good old Roman tradition). The many residences of bureaucrats in posh areas throughout the country are mute witnesses to the fact that crime does pay, the profit potential increasing with rank and authority. Various blue-ribboned commissions have pontificated endlessly about the root causes of corruption and remedies thereby, but billions of rupees continue to be taken annually out of badly needed public development programmes into private pension plans. This is not a wild statement, it is simply a direct quote from an ex-Finance Minister, which leads one to a silly question, if he knew all about it, why didn’t he do something? Next question.

While one can really write volumes about various means of corruption in each department of the Government starting from the smallest Peon at the bottom of the totem pole taking his compulsory salutations (“salami”), it would be futile to discuss this in detail within the confines of a newspaper article, rather it would be more appropriate to confine ourselves to discussing generally the corrupt practices at the very top of the scale which may befall a political Government on its ascendancy to power and which if controlled can have a salutary effect down the line. Perhaps it would be good reading for government functionaries, elected or otherwise, to read the article about “skim-ocracy in Pakistan” in the international magazine “Business Month”, January 1989 issue.

Our new leaders must really worry about the corruption that may be inspired because of the pulling of various strings by their immediate family/friends in affairs of administration. More times than less the politician is himself/herself not prone to corruption but becomes corrupted when people use his/her name and position and (1) he/she does not know it or (2) he/she knows it but chooses to ignore it because he/she is (a) afraid to tackle the problem head on due to familial inhibitions or (b) ignores it because of political expediency. However if the politician is corrupt himself/herself the whole concept of the ball game is changed, the level of malfeasance becoming more pronounced. For a poor country like Pakistan, this can be disaster magnified, translated into the desperate poverty and hunger for the masses that the PM is talking so assiduously about eradicating. It is no use being honest yourself if you condone corruption either knowingly or unknowingly. If corruption flourishes within one’s knowledge then one is as guilty as the persons actually involved. If the corruption flourishes without the knowledge of the leaders, then they are not fit to rule the country. The premise of honest government is that they must have the desire and the ability to close down the avenues of corruption and of bringing the corrupt to justice, particularly those among one’s own family and close associates. The late Gen Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh was one of the most honest of leaders in any Third World countries, his personal honesty an example to rulers the world over, yet he presided over one of the most corrupt administrations in history. Part of the problem arose from his soldierly basic naivety towards the norms of politics, e.g. allowing a minister to “raise” funds for the “official” political party from the commissions of a huge petroleum deal, except that the “Chor Mantri” (or Thief Minister, literally) pocketed 90% of the so-called “funds” for his own personal use. In the end it did not make a difference if Ziaur Rehman’s personal integrity was above question, the net result was worse than if he had been corrupt himself.

Ms Benazir should have no doubts that the hyenas are moving in for political plums. As things settle down into the normal bureaucratic routine in Islamabad, she will not have to look around to find that things are progressing so apace according to normal script that one particular international crook who owes various foreign and nationalised banks about Rs 500 million in some fraud or the other and would openly boast that he was especially close to the inner circles of former PM Junejo (not directly but through associates and relations) is now rumoured to be about to land up (if he has not already) in the close inner circles of the present administration, such are the slimy ways of these weasels of corruption. Some advisers may have Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde personalities, living the big lie of being more honest than the Pope in front of the PM while using the full benefit of administrative authority, particularly the police, for their own benefit, their friends, family — or even lady admirers. They may be extremely loyal to the PM as indeed they were to her late father — their actions sank him more than anything else.

Any government that really wants to eradicate corruption must start at the very top. The first step is to appoint an elder among the known honest party leaders as head of a watchdog committee that will have the solitary responsibility of ensuring that the PM and her Cabinet is kept sanitized from the machinations of friends, relatives, etc with various “business aspirations”. Any violations should be brought to the notice of the PM unofficially on a daily basis. This will do wonders about heartache down the political road, what to talk about all-encompassing scandal causing the national conscience grief from time to time and frustration at the limitations of a democratic system between promises made and the reality. Every Ministry/department should have similar anti-corruption monitoring individuals (dare we call them Ombudsmen) down the line. This is another way to profitably employing the party activists, particularly the idealists among them who will ensure that their government remains clean, this also ensures healthy participation by the party men in the broad spectrum of administration, albeit only in a monitoring role. People like Shaikh Rashid and Dr Mubashar Hasan are wasted out in the cold. Great care should be exercised to ensure that the individuals thus appointed have no executive role in administration otherwise the new system envisaged would tend to be eventually corrupted.

Like inflation, corruption force-multiplies on itself till it has become an inescapable part of daily life. For too long we have been weak in our resolve to root out corruption at the highest reaches of Government. Just planning to take deterrent action does not solve the problem, we must ensure that systems are evolved in a manner that except for the extreme necessities of national security everything is open for detailed public scrutiny. Mention has recently been made of publishing a WHITE PAPER, this is a waste of time unless the allegations made are pursued and made to stick. Washing dirty linen in public without using permanent detergent makes no sense. Further the very use of the phrase is wrong, if it is to come black deeds, we should opt for calling it a BLACK PAPER and instead of it being pigeonholed as an inanimate superfluity we may use it as a prosecution document, giving the accused the benefit of liability claims if the charges are proved to be wrong and defamatory in nature. Before we start prosecuting the guilty we must put our house in order for the present and future, enforcing Draconian laws for misdemeanours, particularly violation of the sacred trust of office and responsibility. The whole gamut of administration must be studied in detail, deregulation and decontrol spreading over a wide spectrum so that government ceases to be concerned all the time in every aspect of a citizen’s life but should be available on an “as required” basis to support the citizen’s needs. Any attempt to solve personal problems by using government machinery should be made a fit case for prosecution — even if it means persecution.

Whichever way one looks the PM has to first sanitize her inner circle of family, friends and advisers and circumscribe their capacity to indulge in misusing authority (and privileges). In the final analysis, the lurid tales of wrongdoing, justified or not, will emanate from this lofty pinnacle, it is one of the prices one pays for the privilege of ruling any country. The people are not fools, true they can be swayed by adverse propaganda, in the end they have a peasant instinct about separating right from wrong. In democracy one depends upon the court of public opinion to correctly evaluate one’s performance and integrity, the former being relative, the latter being acutely subjective. While the public sentiment can be fickle for many reasons, the stark economic choices make them extremely sensitive to any sense of wrongdoing, understanding being limited in our less-than-educated masses to perceptions rather than substance, reality being enforced hunger and deprivation.

We are ensconced in a vicious circle of economic despair, much of our dire straits attributable to corruption, compounded manifold by rank, inefficient public sector management, that we have not reached economic apocalypse is only a miracle, that we are tottering on the brink there should be no doubt. Our troubles stem from the rampant white-collar bureaucracy originated fraud, nepotism and chicanery, starting from the encouragement by our public sector guardians to individuals and entities for cheating the very system they are supposed to protect by the non-payment of government dues in the form of taxes and duties (in return for receiving a small percentage for “good advice” and looking the other way) and in the acceptance in procurement of sub-standard supplies and services. Effective measures by Ms Benazir will certainly result in short-term problems for her as the culprits are moneyed and powerful but she has the masses behind her and the privilege of ruling Pakistan demands that she pay full heed to the wishes of the electorate and wipe at corruption.

Though every politician is essentially a pragmatist, Ms Benazir’s spoken and written words hold out the hope of a practical idealist, ready to compromise on certain matters but stubborn on principles. The weeks and months ahead should separate fact from fiction. Hopefully we will find that she is a whole person in all senses of the word and in the eradication of corruption shall spare neither friend nor foe. In the campaign against corruption, the methods may vary but the genuineness of her inclination to actually take action will be reflected in manifold increase in economic benefits for the masses. Her intimate report-card will reflect this more than any other factor, her place in history dependant upon her ability to come to terms with the awesome reality of corruption in our daily lives.

Did you enjoy this post? Why not leave a comment below and continue the conversation, or subscribe to my feed and get articles like this delivered automatically to your feed reader.