By Amin Kef Sesay
At the 32nd Session of the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday June 2, 2021, President Bio told global leaders that Sierra Leone believes that, “…the fight against corruption is good for governance, peace, businesses and good for increasing national development…”
Since the late President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah established the ACC in the early 2000s, as evidenced to by the Auditor General’s annual audit of public funds, promising anti-corruption programs have capitulated soon after take-off.
They failed largely because successive administrations have had to make the difficult choice between provoking the wrath of potentially destabilizing powerful pro-corruption forces and pressing on with the war on corruption.
The current anti-corruption campaign pursued by President Bio is perhaps the most revealing. President Bio rode to power in 2018 principally on the strength of his electioneering pledge to wage a fearless anti-corruption war as his priority.
The majority of the electorate granted him the democratic mandate to perform that feat. After notable initial triumphs, the war on corruption lost momentum. Today we see it openly practiced by Traffic Police Officers, Traffic Wardens, Police Station Officers, Teachers, School Heads, Hospital Staffs, etc.
Thus, many are of the opinion that, although he told the UNGA that, “the country has consistently had control of corruption indicators in the MCC Scorecard, leading to it being selected to develop a compact”; like past administrations, the Bio led New Direction Government has lost or is losing the war on corruption. This, many say, is due to the Government’s failure to address the underlying causes of corruption
As it appears the impetus to fight corruption is subdued by the cognizance of the adverse implications of such an undertaking on the survival of the administration and sustenance of political stability.
It is not that that there is lack of awareness of its adverse impacts, nor the desire to dismantle the regime of corruption. Instead, attempts to combat corruption easily buckle under the pressure of potent ’anti-anti-corruption’ reactions.
Worse than non-compliance with anti-corruption measures, anti- anti-corruption reactions emanate from powerful pro-corruption forces determined to stymie anti-corruption efforts that threaten their continuous reproduction. These forces possess the capability to undermine political stability and survival of an administration that pursues a tough war on corruption.
This is because the State itself is fragile – in the sense that it is not strong enough to perform effectively rudimentary governance functions (including enforcing rules on acceptable conduct in public service and society) and ensure constructive State-society interactions.
So what happens is that the anti- anti-corruption forces dictate the terms for creating and maintaining stability.
Conducting any form of governance rests not on the State’s ability to exercise its sovereign authority (which it lacks internally), but on a system of appeasement and patronage.
Hence, State-society relationship is characteristically transactional, hinged on preserving a regime of unrestrained illicit accumulation of public resources by prevailing social forces.
Not recognized is how this situation affects anti-corruption enforcement as the administration is confronted with a ’share or fight’ dilemma: perpetuate the regime of corruption and maintain stability or combat corruption at the risk of upsetting the equilibrium.
Whatever the choice, the outcomes are consequential. Allowing the pillaging undermines development, and fighting corruption becomes counterproductive to the administration’s longevity and sustenance of stability.
