The List of Shame made public this week has shed light into corruption in government. Commonly used avenues of corruption include: procurement procedures, abuse of office, diverting public funds from intended use and questionable wealth. Various public officers allegedly have cases to answer.
Most of the elected officials have declined to step aside, citing various issues, either law or jurisdiction, as directed by the President. Stepping aside, while only a Kenyan practice, does not amount to being guilty. Every accused person is presumed innocent until proven guilty by the courts.
Tabling of the list of shame in Parliament coincided with the Parliamentary Initiatives Network (PIN) release of a report on the implementation of chapter 6 by all arms of government. The report titled; Towards Hazy Horizons; spotlights shortcomings that still exist in making leadership and integrity matters a reality as envisioned in the Constitution.
Guided by jurisprudence from the courts, the report affirms the purpose of Chapter six is to set higher standards of integrity for persons seeking to serve as state officers. The report backed its leadership culpability claims with the case between Trusted Society of Human Rights Alliance v The Attorney General and Others. In that case, the High Court observed that
“…a person is said to lack integrity when there are serious unresolved questions about his honesty, financial probity, scrupulousness, fairness, reputation, soundness of his moral judgment or his commitment to the national values enumerated in the Constitution. In our view, for purposes of the integrity test in our Constitution, there is no requirement that the behaviour, attribute or conduct in question has to rise to the threshold of criminality. It therefore follows that the fact that a person has not been convicted of a criminal offence is not dispositive of the inquiry whether they lack integrity or not…it is enough if there are sufficient serious, plausible allegations which raise substantial unresolved questions about one’s integrity.”
It is therefore evident that a person needs not to be criminally culpable for them to have questionable integrity.
The lack of transparency around procurement, tendering and signed agreements provide avenues for looting in public office. Corruption is not limited to bribery alone. For instance, keeping wealth declaration forms confidential undermines transparency and they must be made public.
In practice, most public officials privatize public resources. Audits of their lives before, during and after office reveal this phenomenon.
Kenya’s problem is not laws but implementation of laws. Kenyan laws are adequately robust in fighting corruption and providing provisions for integrity to inform decisions in public office. People need to resign when implicated as a sense of honor not when told by someone else.
It is time that those convicted of corruption also have their wealth, which was acquired illegally, confiscated and used for public good. It is also time those implicated in corruption to not just step aside, but resign to allow to fair and proper investigations. What say you?
credit link: http://www.mzalendo.com/blog/2015/04/03/to-curb-corruption-integrity-in-public-office-is-a-must/
