Reporter's Notebook Comments

• I believe that corruption is gradually being weeded out, largely due to the pressure that the media keeps bringing to bear on the government. It is interesting to note that the report mentions the recent cocaine scandal that hit the country and calls for the resignation of the inspector general of police and all those mentioned in the scandal. It has been recommended that the director general of police operations be prosecuted. Now while all those in the country listed for prosecution have been remanded in custody by a court, it is still not known if this high ranking police officer will be arraigned in court because not even state officials seem to know when he is to be put before court. At least for now he is still a free man.
  
  State anti-corruption institutions do not have access to enough resources to fight corruption. The Office of Accountability, which was set up in 2004 to investigate reported corruption in state institutions, does not have the necessary legal backing and public goodwill. A recent publication carried by the newspaper I work for, which had the chairman of the Office of Accountability attacking the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) for its investigations into the conduct of a minister of state, Dr. Richard Anane, drew a lot of public condemnation. It for instance damned CHRAJ's report, which recommended the minister's removal from office for conflict of interest and abuse of power in his dealings with his American mistress and even questioned CHRAJ's jurisdiction.
  
  CHRAJ, which draws its power from the constitution, is also disabled because it lacks the logistics and the power to prosecute those found guilty of corruption.
  
  For further insight into challenges of fighting corruption, also see an article by Dr. Baffour Agyemang Duah, associate executive director of the Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD), entitled "Curbing Corruption and Improving Economic Governance: The Case of Ghana."
  
  
• I do not think the increasing negative views on corruption can be interpreted as showing that our society is cleaning up. It rather shows that society is getting more and more frustrated with the worsening corruption situation in the country. The media is also becoming more and more vigorous in its reportage on corruption issues.
  
  The people willing to decry the status quo with regards to corruption and expose it are a small minority in the country. Most people, including the poor who suffer most from corruption in terms of denials of service delivery, still think that corruption is a normal part of life and admire wealth no matter how it is acquired.
  
  The findings of the Committee of Enquiry to investigate the missing cocaine and the fact that it has implicated senior Police Officers and other top government officials and respected citizens should give cause to worry. It is noteworthy that as the investigations were going on the key witnesses who came forward voluntarily to testify were arrested by a forty-man police force armed to the teeth. This was viewed as an attempt to intimidate them and prevent them from giving further implicating evidence. In any case, the missing cocaine has not been found. It was even more saddening that when it appeared the Inspector General of Police was being implicated, all past IGPs came out to defend him. This appeared to be a defence of corruption by the highest rank of the Police Service both past and present. At the end of the investigations there were no resignations and some people threatened the journalists who spoke and wrote critically of the allegations, especially against a prominent traditional ruler whose name came up a number of times in the enquiry.
  
  It is true that police demand money and take bribes from commercial drivers on a daily basis even when they are found to have done nothing wrong and private drivers when they commit a road traffic offence but police stopped registering vehicles a long time ago. It is because of the corruption that the police did not initially want to pass the registration to the Vehicle Examination Licensing Department.
  
  The example of an accused person bribing the prosecutor and the parents to drop a case of rape is a clear indication that people's attitudes to corruption have not changed. In the ministries, courts and civil service people demand bribes and people are willing pay for services. In hospitals and schools service providers charge illegal fees or pocket legal fees or overcharge fees while there are cases of thefts of books and drugs, etc.
  
  The experience of Florence Dennis again shows the general attitude towards corruption, as it is acceptance of bribery as a normal part of business. In the Dr. Richard Anane case, the President would not even fire him but had to wait for him to resign at his own time. The CHRAJ has a constitutional mandate that it successfully carried out with the support of a few media persons. In fact, it is a small section of the media that can be described as a positive force in the fight to hold government accountable. There is another section of the media that always defends the government no matter the situation and the issues involved.
  
  The government has performed woefully inadequately in the fight against corruption and has failed to pursue its policy of zero tolerance for corruption which it promised Ghanaians in the campaigns that led to its being elected to power in 2000. The laws cited have been on the drawing board since 2001 and only got passed this year. In any case, another important law that would promote transparency and expose corruption, the Freedom to Information Bill has still not been passed. These are all promises that the government made six years ago and some government officials have expressed regrets for repealing the Criminal Libel law.