Whether one begins with Ebou Jallows chilling tale of outright theft and malfeseance of the worst kind perpetrated by the preisdent and his leutenants or government employees stealing what little money they have access to , or using their positions to extort the already tittering population, we have become a nation that is functionally awash in corruption. Our contemporary history is replete with failures that has everything to do with how we conduct our affairs. At the very heart of our engagements is the incessant likelihood of corruption resulting in a societal conditioning that totally removes any stigma , shame or even fear of God . Ordinarily you would think a common thief ought to be ostracized at the very least. In a perverse and very odd way our society celebrates and is often impressed by people who are demonstrably corrupt. How else does a God fearing people tolerate as their leader who a day before he seized power would be hard pressed to buy an apple from the market stalls in serrekunda but now displays ostentatious wealth proven to be ill-gotten? The answer lies in the rather unhealthy national psyche that is accepting of wrongdoing. The struggling taxi driver has long accepted extortion from traffic police as the normal cost doing business. The businessman is all too eager to have the custom officer examining his imported goods let him avoid paying the required taxes and duties preferring instead to meet him somewhere later to offer him bribes. On and on it goes so that every facet of our society has become entangled in this untenable web of evil. The kind of remedy that would begin to correct the situation would be a long and arduous process. First and foremost would be a legislative fix that would begin by forbiding government employees from accepting any gratuities. The same legislation would explicitly define corruption of every concievable form and attach strict penalties for those who break the law. It would also be accompanied by a strong enforcement mechanism that would vigilantly ferret out wrongdoers in a sustained manner. If people start getting decades long prison terms for corruption and breaching the public trust , a strong message would be sent to the public as a whole who would begin to appreciate the virtues of a society that tries to be honest. The combination of fear of severe punishment and open/honest and fair governance would begin to spur an attitudinal change because the people's faith in authority and those that occupy positions would be predicated on the notion that doing the right thing is the only way. Unless we get ourselves a leadership that itself is free of the morass that this current regime is full of ,fighting corruption in Gambia would be a lost cause. You simply can't have a bunch of crooks begin to do anything about an issue as profound and deeply ingrained as corruption is in the Gambia. Our best bet is to work for the day we can put every corrupt person on trial and severely punish them. I have always maintained that a worry-free retirement in Kanalai or Morrocco is not something President Jammeh should look forward to. The same fate awaits his cronies in government and business. Karamba ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html ----------------------------------------------------------------------------