The scourge of corruption

I read somewhere; people are saying that FDI is avoiding Malaysia because of overt Malay supremacist tendencies. Politicians are quick to apportion blame to insignificant NGOs like Perkasa. Well, if the blame game is to be played fairly, then it should also be apportioned to Chinese based NGOs. Many of the same politicians who are quick draw McGraw when it comes to Malay NGOs are slothful when it comes to Chinese based NGOs.

The same duplicitous tendency is reflected in discussing wealth ownership in this country. We are over eager to discuss the ownership of 65% of this country's population of the elusive 30% wealth of this country; but we are dreadfully silent and seemed hesitant to debate the ownership of 70% of the wealth of this country by 35% of the people underscored with our readiness to ignore their ethnic origins. I am advocating we damn the 35% without caring whether there are Malays, Chinese or Indians. They are our common enemy NOT the 65% eking out a meaningful life.

But it's not this shameless duplicity that I want to debate at the moment. I only wish to point out that the more sinister cause for the plight of FDI is corruption. Corruption is like a plague; everyone dreads it, knows the danger but AVOID going into serious discussion as to the causes behind corruption.

In the Asia Sentinel, there was an interesting article about the rising scourge of corruption. Among the cases that were the object of public scorn are:-

1. The Commonwealth Games sporting extravaganza brought to light the murky dealings ofpoliticians and sports officials who had forged papers, bought equipment and materials at inflated prices and generally cooked the books. The budget eventually ballooned to around US$6 billion, even as it was hit by delayed venues and organizational problems.
2. Another scam has been the most mind-boggling of the lot. In this, the Telecommunications Minister Andimuthu Raja, who was recently forced to resign, undersold 2G spectrum mobile licenses to 85-odd global firms at a throw-away price, losing the exchequer Rs1.76 trillion. Wags point out that the number of suitcases Raja would have needed to fill that loot, if laid end-to-end, would reach from Delhi to the southern city to Chennai (a distance of 2,177 km).

Using the two cases above, we note the following:-

1. Corruption occurs when people in authority are vested with powers to make purchases or who are able to commit funds.
2. Two, corruption is most often associated with people holding public office and who inhabit officious positions.

It is also interesting to see a detailed breakdown of the major players of corruption. For instance in India, the main players in corruption are found to be categorised as follows:-

The bulk of the corruption cases involved government officials and leaders. The greatest sources of bribe demands were from national level Government officials (33%), the police (30%), state/provincial officials and employees (16%), and city officials (10%) respectively.

This leads us to ask the question, why is it, the public sector is the sector most prone to corruption?

These observations also lead us to evolve a practical definition of corruption. Essentially it is the misuse of public office positions for private gain.

Hence, from the standpoint of public perception, corruption almost always involved those holding public positions- government positions, politicians and all those holding any levers of power, rules and regulations.

As a general rule, corruption usually involves some sort of link between bureaucracy, politics and criminals.

If we are not careful Malaysia will not only be considered a soft state, but is slowly becoming a consideration state where everything can be had for a consideration. Soft state in the sense, even the PM appears powerless to stop the rot and is therefore sucked into the whirlpool of complicity. I have written elsewhere that in order to acquire credibility, the PM must have his Voltaire moment. 'Execute' some admirals so that other admirals fall into line. Translation: prosecute 2-3 ministers for corruption.

Today, the number of ministers with an honest image can be counted on fingers. At one time, bribe was paid for getting wrong things done but now bribe is paid for getting right things done at right time.