The private-sector trees for the public-sector woods.

"The private sector has always been culpable because bribery is a two-way street. In every public sector corruption scandal there’s one or several private companies involved. A recent example is the procurement scandal at the Ministry of Devolution and Planning. Suppliers acted in cahoots with some department officials to defraud taxpayers of hundreds of millions of shillings. The sector is unregulated, making it vulnerable to corruption. The situation is exacerbated by lack of mechanisms to make corporates accountable. The government is rather focused on tax compliance and licensing. There is overemphasis of corruption in the public sector, yet private companies are the perpetrators. Please underline and walk around today saying that phrase 'private companies are the perpetrators'. - http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/private-sector-corruption-dangerous#sthash.nyKMDsjZ.dpuf

That remarkable statement is attributed to a man called Sebastian Gatimu. He alleges, in turn, the [private] sector is unregulated, making it vulnerable to corruption; there are no mechanisms to make corporates accountable; private companies are the perpetrators of corruption. What a spectacular charge.

I have no love for the corrupt, whether they sit back-left in a serikali limousine or charge about like Sir Galahad in their modern-day steed, the Range Rover Sport (Supercharged). If there is a species of humanity that should suffer the most sulphuric of the sulphur-filled pits of hell, it is the men and women who have made it their mission in life to cheat the innocent of their taxes. It is the least that we can pray for them. 

But just in case it turns out that heaven and hell are imaginary, I hope those with testicles will have them dipped in honey and stuck inside anthills filed with fire ants. I shall leave the women folk to devise fitting penalties for the women who have corrupted the core of the State, the Government of Kenya.

Where do I begin with these ridiculous statements? Unless I have been away on Mars without knowing it and the Law of Kenya was rewritten by monkeys with ten thousand typewriters at their disposal, the Registration of Business Names Act, the Partnerships Act, the Companies Act, the Anti-corruption and Economic Crimes Act and the Penal Code are still in force. If you truly believe that these statutes are feeble, ill-suited to regulating the private sector, then there is little to discuss with you but to offer you this rather fine tin-foil hat. 

The first three are the foundation for the accountability of the private sector and that is even before we apply the Income Tax Act, the Customs and Excise Act, the Tax Procedures Act, the Tax Appeal Tribunals Act or the myriad of "by-laws" enforced by the forty one county governments. Then there are the Banking Act, the Building Societies Act, the Cheques Act...really, regulation and accountability are not in question when it comes to Kenya's private sector.

As to whether the private sector is the perpetrator of corruption, I have neither the data nor the proof that it is not. What is certain, however, is that it really does take two to tango, the briber and the bribed. Either someone (often the public official) solicits a bribe or someone (often the private sector captain of industry) offers a bribe. The transaction is complete when a bribe is given and an unfair advantage is assured for the bribe-giver. Fighting over which is more corrupt, public or private sector, is splitting hair in the most Faustian of fashions and serves its function well to distract us from the discomfitting fact that our public sector is riddles to the core, like Swiss cheese, with the cancer of corruption. No matter how many private sector kingpins we haul to gaol for bribery, the public sectors Augean stables still need to be swept out.

One fact stands out starkly too: the conniving, arm-twisting, ass-kissing, lying, cheating and murdering that takes place to get into the public sector tells you volumes about the relationship between those who make and enforce the rules and those who would wish to avoid the rules enforced against them - or even made at all. You only get to know how strong they feel about things when they resist against all reason or logic to retire. Do you know of anywhere else in the world where the top civil servants refuse to retire to their very, very comfortable, multimillion shilling pensions? Don't miss the woods for the trees.