Snowflakes Must Unite!
Pope Francis sums up well the power of collective action: “We — Christians and non-Christians — are snowflakes; but if we unite, we can become an avalanche, a strong and constructive movement.”
Corruption, Pope Francis has said, is “like a body that in nature enters into a process of decay and stench”. That stench is suffocating South Africa.
“Corruption [replaces] the common good with a particular interest that contaminates every general outlook,” the pope wrote in the preface to Corrosion, a new book by Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson and Italian philosopher Vittorio Alberti. “It is the worst social plague because it generates serious problems and crimes involving everyone.” “…greed and corruption have now become the normal way of organising our social, political and economic relationships in South Africa.”
The decay of corruption set in well before President Jacob Zuma took office in 2009, himself under the cloud of still-unresolved allegations of financial improprieties. In the intervening years, the scandals involving Mr Zuma, many of his ministers and parastatal appointees have escalated into a deluge of corruption and incompetence.
The recently leaked Gupta e-mails, if they are authentic, suggest that the extent of state-looting by the Gupta family and their surrogates in government exceeds even our most outlandish suspicions.
Bishop Abel Gabuza, in a statement released by the bishops’ Justice & Peace Commission, rightly observes that “the continued allegations of corruption throughout [President Zuma’s] term of office have weakened the state’s resolve and credibility to fight the cancer which is corruption”.
The bishop observes: “As a result, greed and corruption have now become the normal way of organising our social, political and economic relationships in South Africa.”
As Bishop Gabuza points out, corruption preceded Mr Zuma’s presidency. On a large scale, there was the arms deal under President Thabo Mbeki (in which Mr Zuma’s name first came up in relation to corruption), and the cover-up that followed. And a solid argument can be made to compare the Guptas’ state capture now with the Broederbond’s state capture under the apartheid regime.
But where 20 years ago the relatively minor Sarafina 2 scandal, presided over by then-health minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, was regarded as a big matter, the never-ending flow of corruption that followed, and the craven racketeering by big business, has normalised all manner of dishonesty.
Bishop Gabuza notes this in his statement, saying that many public services have become “collection points” for bribes, and that many jobs in both the public and private sectors are obtainable only through the payment of backhanders.
His verdict is sharp and accurate: “The moral fibre of our nation is clearly broken.”
It is a verdict that may be applied to many other countries in the world. Indeed, some countries have legalised and institutionalised corruption. The lobby system and campaign financing regulations in the United States are a good example of insidious corruption made legal.
On a global scale, South Africa ranks in the midfield of corrupt nations, though that position is due to our vigilant and resilient civil society, media and independent judiciary rather than any restraint on the part of those who are brazenly looting the state’s coffers. Corruption has no colour, no ideology. The evil of greed is universal.
And it is civil society that must combat corruption. We must stand up to corruption: to those who demand that their palms be greased, to kleptocratic politicians and their principals, and to businesses that collude in price-fixing and other manipulations that exploit people.
And in doing so, our outrage must not be mitigated by the rhetoric of race or political partisanship. Corruption has no colour, no ideology. The evil of greed is universal.
Pope Francis himself has acknowledged that corruption can happen even in churches. Corruption can happen to any of us.
So our stand against corruption demands also individual introspection. How are we breaking moral and ethical laws in our everyday lives? When do we act with impunity — whether it’s stealing a pencil at work or bribing an official — simply because we can get away with it?
We have to battle our own temptations every day. And we must also unite to combat the culture of corruption in our society, business and politics — not in sporadic protests but in a sustained manner that communicates that we have had enough of Zupta, of price-fixing, of corporate exploitation, of greasing palms.
Pope Francis sums up well the power of collective action: “We — Christians and non-Christians — are snowflakes; but if we unite, we can become an avalanche, a strong and constructive movement.”
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