SHOULD WE JUST ACCEPT CORRUPTION AS A MODERN DAY WAY OF LIFE?
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newspaper columnist stated in an article that “In Africa, accumulating wealth has become the life goal of many citizens. So ingrained is this notion that it no longer matters whether one has beaten, robbed or stolen one’s way into wealth.
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As long as one is wealthy, respect, power and access to opportunities often follow. The obsession with wealth fuels corruption at both the macro and micro level because individuals want to save money or make money by dabbling in what is essentially immoral and/or illegal behaviour.”
gain”. Typically this involves bribery which the Oxford dictionary defines as “to dishonestly persuade someone to act in one’s favour by a gift of money or other inducement”. If we stick to definitions, there appears to be a very thin line between what is corrupt and what isn’t.
services required by the government. That is corruption in black and white. But when the ruling coalition dishes out plum jobs to those who contributed towards its campaign, either in monetary terms or through political capital, this is accepted as perfectly normal.
“Should we therefore concede that there is something positive about corruption? That it gives those in power the creativity and motivation to execute initiatives that we will ultimately benefit from. Should we care that South Africa allegedly paid a $10 million bribe for the World Cup, when this possibly enabled us to witness the spectacle for the first time on our continent during our lifetime?....”
I shared the link to the article with a friend and this was his response – “Wealth accumulation by any means is the capitalist way. Profit is king. For someone to win big, some poor people need to get the shaft somewhere. What we have are just iterations of robber barons who are somewhat less sophisticated than the Rockefellers and Carnegies of the late nineteenth century, what we call grabbers, monopolists and tenderpreneurs in local lingo.”
The word corruption is very topical at the moment. Globally the headlines are all about FIFA and a myriad of scandals at the football governing body. So, what is corruption? Transparency International defines the term as “the abuse of entrusted power for private
In the private sector, it is common for employees with the decision making power to award contracts to companies with whom they have an arrangement to receive a hidden kick-back. Corrupt practice? Of course. But how different is this from a scenario where the salespeople wine and dine the decisionmakers; treat them to a round of golf; or send them branded gifts at Christmas time? In the public sector, the main accusation of those facing corruption charges is that they have accepted inducement to award companies tenders to render
In football, FIFA officials are facing charges for having allegedly accepted millions of dollars to vote in favour of certain countries to host the World Cup. This is frowned upon in the very same sport where the regularly victorious clubs are those that have the ability to fork out millions of dollars to players and coaches. It is ok to buy your way to winning a competition but not ok to buy your way to hosting it.
So what yardstick should we use to determine what is corruption and what isn’t? As the newspaper columnist intimates, we should consider what is “immoral and/ or illegal”. Ethics or morality is defined as the extent to which an action is right or wrong. When I worked for an audit firm, the international network sought to publish a code of ethics that would be applicable to all network firms in over 100 countries. It was a near impossible task because what was wrong in one country was fair game in another. There are nations where it is impossible for an audit firm to secure work without