How I Wish We Were Serious In Fighting Corruption

Granted that we have all the requisite tools in fighting corruption in all sectors of the Ghanaian economy, combined with the inadvertent tool that is wittingly or unwittingly been added to our arsenal, we have no excuse if we fail to fight and eliminate corruption in our midst. We have the BNI, EOCO, POLICE, ARMY and a willing mass of people that can march to present evidence of corruption to an institution set up to fight the same menace of corruption as we all saw on Friday the 26th May, 2017.

In the presence of all these tools, the questions we need to ask ourselves is this, why have successive governments failed to fight and reduce corruption? Why is corruption so prevalent in our society? The answer, I believe is simple, "a thief cannot catch a thief man" All the institutions set up to fight corruption are corrupt themselves, so how can they function well in their assigned roles?

Look at the so-called BNI, it is so corrupt that it was willing and managed to protect a criminal, yes not an ordinary criminal but a murderer of a sitting MP. We all saw and read what happened when the killer of J.B. Danka Ado was arrested by the police, this guy started singing like a canary bird ( To borrow but Kuku Anidoho's term). He confessed that they were contracted to kill the man by somebody in high place who hired his accomplice and drove him to show him where the MP lived. Sexy dondon said that his accomplice then after being shown the house of JB by the so-called man in high place, came to recruit him to help him execute the task. He even mentioned what he used some of his recruitment fee for. Then all of a sudden, the BNI took over the case and the next day, sexy dondon started changing his story as was directed by the BNI, now nobody hired them to kill JB but rather it was an attempted robbery that went bad. How on earth can an institution that was set up to unearth hidden truth itself help people who wanted to tell the truth conceal the truth? This one case shows the extent to which the BNI is a rotten institution undeserved of the tax payers’ money. In fact, I am even surprised that all the top brass are still at post given the way they have proven to be corrupt.

In fact, one of the major tools we have at our disposal in fighting corruption which we have failed to deploy is something called surplus labor. If I am not mistaken, I would say that, people seeking job are more than those employed by the government now. For every one accountant employed now, there are about three equally qualified accountants unemployed. This tool is so sharpened that, we even have unemployed graduate association in Ghana that we can tap into to replace corrupt guys.

It is up to the government to be firm and tell those lucky to be employed that they are privileged to be where they are and if they can not endear themselves very well and adhere to the basic tenets of their jobs, then they risk being fired and replaced with a willing unemployed person. In fact, with the slightest perception of corruption, people must be interdicted and immediately replaced whiles investigation goes on. This is the only way people would sit up and be serious with their jobs.

Government, if they were serious in fighting corruption would begin to issue ultimatum to agencies to work to clear all backlogs in two months or risk mass termination. If any serious government issues a two months ultimatum to ECG to clear all outstanding meter and billing issues or risk mass firing, I bet you that ECG would become a profitable institution in two months. The same must go to Lands commission, passport office, regitrar of companies, SIC, TOR, and indeed all government agencies and departments.

If a teacher is not going to school to teach and yet getting his/her paycheck alright, fire him/her and replace him with an unemployed teacher, after all, there are thousands of qualified teachers seeking jobs. The same must go for our nurses,

I do not see why we all cry loud about corruption yet we leave corrupt people at post whilst some good people equally qualified roam the street unemployed. The solution is to crack the whip. fire and replace people and those lucky to be working would know that they cannot take their jobs for a spin.