Marking 4th International Anti-Corruption Day
Crowing Corruption in Nepal
NARAYAN MANANDHAR
"If you have to put so much effort just to stay in the same place; imagine how hard you have to work to swim upward." This dialogue comes from Alice in the Wonderland. It fits the comments recently made by a friend who, after four years of stint in an anti-corruption agency, left for another department within the civil service. He commented that working in the field of anti-corruption is like going against the trend. Yes, working in the field of anti-corruption is like swimming against the current. When whole society is in pursuit of money and fame, or when "how to get rich or rather quick rich?" is the mantra of living, invariably anti-corruption becomes an unpopular business in itself. Corruption may be a global problem; it could be a national problem but when you translate or operationalise anti-corruption efforts; it is turned into a local or even a personal problem. Anti-corruption business brings in, not friends, but enemies and spoilers. For anti-corruption business echoes the voices of the opponents. It is working and going against the establishment. Therefore, it is no wonder to have one out of every four journalists killed in the world happened to be reporters (un)covering corruption stories. In a world where the business of corruption is a low-risk and high-return, it is normal to have anti-corruption turning into a high-risk low-return business. An increasing number of anti-corruption workers or corruption fighters are now demanding some kind of security in their profession. The story of Mr. John Githongo from Kenya is only a recent example. Converting anti-corruption business, from a high-risk low-return business to a high-return low-risk business has come as a major challenge.
Having spent nearly three years in anti-corruption business, unlike my friend from the government, I did not have to earn foes than friends. My work was basically confined to policy advices and advocacy works. But during my tenure, definitely, I did face unique challenges, sometime amusing, some time confusing. The first one is obviously a personal attack. "You are into anti-corruption business simply because you did not have an opportunity to be corrupt." The extension of this logic is that, given the opportunity, every one is corrupt. The accusations do have a profound impact on anti-corruption business. Temptation to be corrupt seems to be equally, if not normally, distributed among the populace and what matters is controlling the opportunity for corruption. However, what is frustrating here is that the accusation has come more as a defense against corruption rather a policy prescriptions for anti-corruption activities.
Having written numerous articles on corruption and participated in innumerable formal and informal presentations on corruption and anti-corruption, made to a wide variety of audiences over the last three years, I am literally shocked when one of the participants, coming from a remote districts of Nepal, spoke to me that my work could led to more, not less corruption. His reasoning goes like this: By opening up the intricacies of corruption business I have, howsoever, inadvertently made public aware that there is a short-cut route to doing business in and with the government. I am not sure whether anti-corruption messages are, in fact, spreading the messages of corruption. This hypothesis needs testing. The problem with us is: Can we talk of anti-corruption business without talking corruption first?
Most frustrations reside when anti-corruption businesses, agencies, organisations and individual themselves are corrupted in one way or other. What is the moral ground of talking anti-corruption stand when the foundation itself is infested with corruption? In such instances, anti-corruption becomes nothing more than a moral preaching exercise in futility. "I am holier than thou" seems to be the norm when it comes to anti-corruption exercises. It is shameful to listen to anti-corruption lectures from the Finance Minister who master-minded the Voluntary Income Disclosure Scheme (VIDS). In almost all CIAA initiated corruption cases on holding of disproportionate property, the accused have sought to defend their case behind the veil of VIDS. As per this scheme if you pay certain portion of your income as a tax to the state, you are not obliged to disclose your income source. This is a cute strategy designed to turn all black money into white one, all in the name of mobilizing state revenues. I honestly hope this idea did not originate from the World Bank.
Let me also share with you here a real life joke on corruption. In November last year, along with a foreign consultant, studying obstacles to doing business in Nepal, I was interviewing a number of business people in Eastern Nepal. Here is what went on between us and the jute manufacturer.
"Is corruption a major problem in your line of business?"
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, I am. Corruption is not a problem in my business."
"May we ask why it is not a problem in your business?"
"Because we all are habituated by corruption!"
So corruption is a habitual problem with the business community. During my work, I have found private sector business to be the most reluctant body to talk about corruption in Nepal. You can talk about corruption with a civil servant or with his political master, but when it comes to business people, it is simply a taboo. If one reads the genesis and evolution of anti-corruption works, invariably, one will find the role and contributions of the private sector in the Western world. Even to date, the largest funding of Transparency International, a Berlin based international anti-corruption organization, comes from private sector contributions. It is amazing, if not shameless, to find in Nepal, the business leadership to be occupied by a black-listed entrepreneur. It is totally misdirected effort to tackle corruption merely by pointing accusing finger on the bureaucrats and the political masters. The private sector constitutes the supply-side of corruption. Without tackling the supply-side, merely attacking the demand-side is going against the laws of economics.
Over the last decade, we have overemphasized on demand-side. Invariably, the civil society movement against corruption has created demands for good governance, transparency and accountability. In the name of empowerment, to some extent, we have pampered them. Often the demands, expected to create a "voice mechanism", are lost in high decibel noises giving an impression of the early morning crowing of a crow. A part from constant crowing, "Corruption has increased! Corruption has increased!" have we ever given a serious thought on the manner and venue of increased corruption in Nepal? In Nepali there is a saying: Kag karaudai chha, pina suk dai chha. For a non-Nepali reader, an explanation is required here. The crowing of a crow (kag karaudai chha) has no relations, whatsoever, with the drying of mustard cakes (pina suk dai chha), yet gives an impression that both activities are related. Could it be true that similar thing is happening with corruption and anti-corruption activities?
A way back in 1968, Prof. Gunnar Myrdal has quoted Santhanam Committee Report, "Merely shouting from the house-tops that everybody is corrupt creates an atmosphere of corruption. People feel they live in a climate of corruption and they get corrupted themselves. The man in the street says to himself, if everybody seems to be corrupt why shouldn't I be corrupt?" It is not just corruption that is bad, improperly designed anti-corruption efforts too can turn bad. It is like prescribing wrong medicine to right a disease.
How do you tackle corruption when at the one end of the spectrum you have citizens who are deeply ingrained with the belief that without bribing some one you cannot get anything from the government than, at the other end, you have civil servants (actually, Churchill has called them evil masters) who are preoccupied with self-fulfilling prophesies like these - "if I do not take bribe, some one will", or "even if I remain honest, no one is going to believe me".
Anti-corruption business is as simple as cleaning of your house. We just make things complicated. If your house is dirty, if it is smelly, where do you start your cleaning campaign? Definitely, you look for the rot. Is it coming from the kitchen or from the toilet? If you have to clean-up your stairs, you start from the top rung. There are definite ways of cleaning a house. Every anti-corruption effort should have a starting point, a logical method to begin with. And this is what is missing in Nepal. It is time now to start thinking on the starting point in our anti-corruption campaign. It is unbelievable why our politicians are deceptively keeping quiet on anti-corruption agenda. Why are they shying away from anti-corruption commitments? If this had not been the case why would CIAA be deliberately made defunct? Why the culprits pointed out by Rayamajhi Commission have not been booked to date? And what kept an all-powerful Interim-Parliament from ratifying UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC)? There must be a reason. Is this to do with pending elections to CA? Or could it just be another power-sharing arrangement – you scratch my back and I will scratch yours? Or are we propagating a perverted inclusive theory of sharing the spoils: Since you stole my money, I too have the right to steal yours?
| < Prev |
|---|
