By James Wakibia
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Corruption remains one of Kenya’s biggest threat
to development, every successive year Transparency International lists our
beloved nation amongst the most corrupt
nations on the face of the earth .It’s not something to beat our chests for,
it’s not like marathons and javelin that we should be proud of, no, it’s
something every same person should be condemning.
According to Transparency international, the bad performance
can be attributed to incompetence and ineffectiveness of anti-corruption agencies
who have failed to punish alleged corruption offenders. The Judiciary, Department
of Public Prosecution and Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission were pointed
out as institutions that have contributed in high corruption levels, they have
failed in the war against corruption.
As a ‘mwananchi’ in the streets am left powerless
and confused and at the mercy of these corrupt powerful people who make life very
expensive and lead to increased poverty.
County governments are in a good position to
bridge the gap between the haves and have nots. Through proper distribution of
resources and good governance it is possible to fight the ever increasing rates
of poverty and to bring the numbers down. But with entrenched corruption I
doubt any positive gains are going to be achieved, more poor people will
continue languishing in pain and wallowing in immeasurable poverty. These
people are suffocating public coffers for their own selfish gains with utmost
impunity. Anything to stop this open thievery must be top priority.
It is saddening that the youth now see corruption
as an easier way to wealth creation.
Reports of maddening and unthinkable amounts spent
on buying goods and services are all over- we all remember the Ksh.109,000 anti-carcinogenic
wheel barrows of Bungoma, Ksh. 2m Facebook account opening fees of Muranga, fat
sitting allowances and generally spending that raises so many questions. Some
with our taxes allegedly have hired gangs to walk around intimidating critics.
Without doubt things are going haywire, MCAs now overstocked with power are unrivaled,
they are demigods- instead of being the watchdogs they can be seen every day
strolling the corridors of governors offices, looking for kickbacks, to move certain
motions in the assemblies.
To effectively reduce poverty in Kenya, runaway
corruption must be eliminated. It is imminent that vision 2030 might just be a pipe
dream. Corruption will always pull us down, and it must be fought.
It’s good that the president came out strongly to
condemn and show the public his stand on corruption, using tough words and stun
face but words and stun face alone and no actions will not fight corruption. It’s
time for a turnaround, those well written speeches that move masses must be
moving thugs to jail. Corruption now a National security problem must be axed;
laws must be enacted and implemented.
We voted for devolution because we believed in it,
we went back in the ballots and brought in people we had faith in, but by default
almost all of them have proved to be the wrong choices, most have pending court
cases, we wish we could do something but it’s so late, we can only watch as
they use our resources to campaign for their reelections, bad for us.
