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| Columns |
| Backbencher |
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by
Anonymous, 28 November 2003
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15:30:56
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It’s all in appeasement policy
Honourable Folks, newspaper allegation that the ambassador to the Republic of China on Taiwan has given jobs to members of her family may be cause for concern but you have to spend the past 10 years in exile in Mars to be surprised.
The culture of bending what is good and acceptable in society for personal gains is well entrenched in multiparty system of government. In various government ministries and departments, embassies and statutory corporations vacancies have been filled by beneficiaries of the “appeasement policy”.
This is the unwritten policy which regards the post-election period as payback time to those who risked their lives or spent their money or gave moral support to the victorious presidential candidate during the campaign period. Such people are given big jobs without having to prove their worth and few lucky ones may even be awarded honorary doctorates by the University of Malawi or University of Mzuzu, courtesy of the Chancellor Dr Bakili Muluzi.
Beneficiaries of the appeasement policy share some characteristics. Usually we don’t know—or we’re not told—why they were given the job through the back door. It is only when they die that their employer—or someone closer to their employer—will attend the funeral and tell the entire nation in solemn tones echoed by MBC what political role the deceased played and why we must all feel sad and mourn the loss.
The beneficiaries usually don’t play by the rules and regulations. They don’t even have to respect authority, especially if the one above them is a political nonentity who got the job on merit. They may be working in the public sector but don’t have to account to the public because their loyalty is to their employer and their tenure is guaranteed by rendering unflinching political support to the one whose hand feeds them.
Wherever they are, they are eyes and ears of their powerful employers and workmates – even bosses – fear them a lot. They just have to pick up the mobile and dial the right number and your job is up in flames, even if you are a star performer.
It is this ability to bend the rules as they please which make them a big liability to the taxpayer and the economy. They take advantage of the loose ends in the Corrupt Practices Act to ransack the economy. They create so many useless trips abroad or to the lake so they can get allowances.
They can claim benefits like company vehicles, mobile phones, sitting allowances etc., which they are not entitled to. They also use their political connections to get loans they will never pay back.
These are the people who urge us all to be hard-working and law abiding when they, themselves, play by different rules. They are the reason why our national economy can’t take off. They are also the reason why we’re heavily taxed and yet government service delivery is so poor. Because of such people, we signed the Sadc Protocol against corruption at the regional heads of state summit held right in Blantyre but we’re afraid to go by the broader definition of corruption in the Protocol. Instead, we shamelessly cling on to our own narrow definition of corruption and an Act that makes it virtually impossible to punish the bad guys.
Such people do not only fleece the economy but they also sink potentially profitable parastatals. The Ministry of Finance knows this and has talked about removing such deadwood from the system in its budget statements but to no avail. Instead, it is the ministers, themselves, who get removed from the Finance Ministry one by one.
Likewise, efforts to restructure the Civil Service to remove overlaps between ministries or departments and shed off deadwood have only resulted in a Civil Service bloated way out of proportion with the economy. The presidency alone has three people and the cabinet has 46 people.
The favours that go with the appeasement policy are a huge cost to the poor. They also contribute to the huge taxes Malawians pay to keep their government afloat. I’m sure we all know someone who falls in the category of beneficiaries of the appeasement policy. It is a much larger problem than allegations of nepotism in our embassy at RoC.
What is rather surprising to me is how the Secretary for Foreign Affairs tried to justify the unjustifiable. Embassies belong to the Malawi nation and vacancies in such places should only be given to right people on merit and in a transparent manner. No cost-cutting measures can justify the alleged hiring of family members.
That someone who should be concerned is actually made to defend such a malpractice only serves to show how rotten the system is.
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