It’s about the money!

ARCHIVES 2012

By admin-s On Sep 6, 2012

Under PM Najib’s administration, we have seen the passing of several progressive-sounding laws like The Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA), the Peaceful Assembly Act and the Security Offences [Special Measures] Act. But that is all it is, nice sounding titles because there are enough provisions in them to nullify their objectives. They are just perception-correction exercises by PM Najib, something that he is very good at.

Thomas Fann

As Malaysians wait in eager expectation for PM Najib to annouce the date of the 13th General Election, one seen by most as a potentially pivotal general election that would decide the future of this country, the stakes are high and the issues many.

As I glance the headlines of newspapers and online media, there are a myriad of issues that surface every day. Today it’s the alternative flag issue, yesterday was the size of rallies, previously and no doubt in the days to come, the ketuanan Melayu issue, Chinese education, marginalization of Indians, the Sabah IC for votes, Hudud, electoral reforms, high or disputed crime rates, police brutality, death in detention, etc. These are all highly sensitive and important issues, especially to those affected by them.

Mother of All Issues

But I would like to suggest that the mother of all issues should be corruption. It is about the money. There is a saying, “The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil”.

According to Transparency International, “Corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain. It hurts everyone who depends on the integrity of people in a position of authority.”

It is more than the receiving of bribes or commission for which the person is not entitled to but it includes cronyism, nepotism, embezzlement, extortion, lobbying with inducements, laziness, incompetence, theft, pilfering, etc.

It is Stealing

Let’s cut through all the chase, corruption is stealing and we are the victim. Let us not gloss over this criminal act by using legal-sounding terms like commission, appreciation, and incentives. It is stealing. When you use your position for private gain either in the form of money, perks, sex, discounts, pervert justice, or favour someone, it is stealing and you are a thief.

Whilst many other countries in the Asia-Pacific region have been making big strides in combating corruption and has risen in ranking on Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index ranking, Malaysia has been slipping. In the 2011 ranking, we are 60th out of 183 countries, a drop of 4 places from the previous year with a score of 4.3/10 (10 being highly clean). In fact, our score has been steadily slipping since 1995 when the first TI CPI index came out when we scored 5.28/10 then.

Perception-Correction Exercises

Some may live in denial and tell us that it is just a perception problem and the solution is to improve public perception by focusing on the positive news and distorting the truth. That in itself is corruption!

Let’s look at the facts. Unfortunately, it is hard to get the facts, thanks to laws that hide the facts like the Official Secrets Acts, Banking and Financial Institutions Act (Bafia) 1989, which do not promote transparency but are used to prosecute whistleblowers of corrupt practices.