Columns

At a public meeting not too far from Colombo last week President Maithripala Sirisena asked a pertinent question. Like Pontius Pilate he did not wait for an answer, probably because he knew what it was.

The question posed was not only relevant but crucial right now seeing the accusations flying around about high-level corruption not only at the political level but also among state officials.

President Sirisena should surely know. His own chief of staff and another state official from the Timber Corporation were arrested by the police for allegedly accepting bribes and are now facing charges against them.

Former president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s chief of staff Gamini Senarat is also due to appear in court shortly for alleged misuse of public funds. Some other high officials have already been sentenced or are being investigated for similar offences.

President Sirisena’s challenge for “clean” politicians to get on to the stage in a public show of cleanliness (not physical of course) might leave plenty of empty stages across the length and breadth of the country if the presidential call was to be replicated in Sri Lanka.

Some readers will recall the old Greek philosopher Diogenes of Sinope who went round the market place carrying a lighted lantern in broad daylight looking for an honest person. Of course his search proved to be fruitless. He went to the wrong place. Who in his right mind would go to the market place looking for an honest person!

Every time I go to Colombo I hear more and more stories of ordinary citizens (that is those with political clout or the influence of senior officials) having to pay “something” (as a bribe or handout is called in the Wonder of Asia) to get normal work done in a state institution which should be available free. It is to perform regular tasks that public officials of whatever level in the institutional hierarchy are paid salaries with public money.

But more and more it appears that public officials — thankfully not all of them, as there are still honest men and women who do not solicit bribes or engage in graft –  dilly dally with files and documents unless and until that “something” is given.

The latest story that came to me just a few days ago was of a young Tamil living in London who had to undergo pressure at the Bandaranaike International Airport’s immigration counter.

This young man and his wife and two children arrived in Colombo at around 8.30 in the morning on August 5. He and his family stood in line at one immigration counter, his wife and two children behind him in the queue.

When his turn came he walked up to the immigration desk. He handed his passport to the immigration officer, who perused it and observed that the passport holder had not travelled to Sri Lanka for 14 years, the last time being 2004. His wife and children travel to Sri Lanka at least once every two years.

The fact that the man came to Sri Lanka after a long time is no crime. Nor it is a violation of the law. But the officer seemed to suggest it was a heinous crime perpetrated on Sri Lanka.

After a few minutes of playing around with the passport, the traveller was asked whether he had any money with him. When he said he did, the passport was handed back to its owner asking him to place the money inside the passport and hand it back.

The money — £40 which is all he had in his pocket — was rather surreptitiously withdrawn, the passport stamped and the man waved to the exit. That is the story this young Tamil told me.

I have heard similar stories before but was somewhat sceptical wondering whether it was a way of denigrating the country. But I have known the man who told me this story for several years and know him as an honest, hard- working chap with no axes to grind. Many have concocted stories including claims of torture and harassment on ethnic grounds to mislead foreign journalists who cook up colourful stories.

But there is enough proof to believe such things happen in other institutions too. Recently a Sri Lankan doctor (his wife and sons are also doctors) told me of his experiences with the Electricity Board office in Kirulapone. But this would take too much time and space to relate. The point is that there was no racial discrimination here. It was crass inefficiency or the greed for “something” and, unlike the mills of God, these do not grind at all unless adequately ‘oiled’.

Sri Lankans who have to visit government offices or public utility institutions are confronted with a variety of hurdles from absentee officials to those seeking their daily ‘bread’. This happens also in local government institutions such as the Colombo Municipal Council and lesser local bodies.

While President Sirisena’s call for clean politicians to step forward will leave many empty spaces, it might be extended to officialdom as well. Speaking at a Colombo meeting of the Global Experts Group on the Jakarta Principles some months ago, he said “in certain instances state officials have been far ahead in bribery and corruption than the politicians.”

That may well be true. But it is the despicable acts of politicians that hit the headlines because they are not only the representatives of the people, they are expected to serve not rob them of funds and service due to them.

Only the other day there were stories circulating widely that a minister and a deputy minister had sought a substantial commission to okay an infrastructure project and Rs 150 million sent to the personal account of some other high up in government.

Whether these stories are true or not one cannot say. Only thorough investigations conducted by investigative agencies left to act independently without interference from political and other circles could establish the truth.

Admittedly there are irresponsible media, particularly social media that operate in a manner that blackens the name of all media because social media lack the responsibilities that are cast on mainstream media and the constraints under which many of them function.

Gossipy social media do not operate under those constraints and so the media across the board are painted and tainted with the same brush. If one does not like a politician or he or she is a potential contender for a position of strategic importance in political circles there would be social media or acolytes in the mainstream media to do the job of tarnishing the image of the rival.

President Sirisena was referring to politicians and senior bureaucrats when he spoke of corruption that had turned cancerous.

The question that one must ask is from where one should start to name and shame these parasites that exist in our society. Should it be a top-down process of exposing those guilty of denuding the nation of its assets or should it be a bottom up process as it might take longer to eliminate the crooks at the top as they have more resources to employ to save their thick skin.

Reaching the crooks at the top is not always easy. They have more means to employ to muddy the waters like the squid that blackens the water making it less visible to the naked eye.

Today the stakes are so high, these political crooks and bureaucratic hangers-on have resources not easily available to those in the lower rungs and so it is the latter who are more easily nailed.

There is another important issue which President Sirisena’s briefly-reported homily on corruption does not mention. He talks of politicians and bureaucrats. But what of the families of these crooked politicians. Are they not on the take? Do they not use the position and power of the political person to pressure and browbeat officials to do their bidding.

One cannot exclude family, friends and relatives from this cancerous growth that is today embedded in the body politic. One way to do so is to make the assets declarations of all political figures especially in the higher echelons and all bureaucrats are made available for public scrutiny. Just getting them to make declarations that end up in the “hamas pettiya” unopened and unread is a travesty. This government promised accountability and transparency. Most often one sees neither.

There is little merit in shouting oneself hoarse about the spreading corruption if one does literally nothing to excavate the holes into which these disease spreading rodents creep.

Would the income tax returns submitted by many politicians and bureaucrats tally with their assets declarations or would there be horrendous discrepancies because there appears to be no way of comparing the two.

Should not the two declarations be thoroughly scrutinized for inconsistencies that now escape such examination? Perhaps the ‘blood hounds’ would be contaminated too.