Corruption is deadly

Corruption is a social disease no less dreadful than AIDS. And it has reached alarming proportions in many developing countries.

Although leaders around the globe must have observed that anti-corruption campaigns can be effective, this societal disease has found fertile ground in countries which have yet to establish sound democratic systems.

We have seen many national leaders fighting against corruption, while others like the former shah of Iran, Reza Pahlevi, and former president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos, let corruption reign until their people took action to eradicate the disease and they ended up without power.

In Malaysia, the anti-graft campaign has been so vigorous and popular that there seemed nothing sensational about hearing yesterday that Malaysian Trade and Industry Minister Rafidah Aziz is being investigated for alleged corruption. The parliament in Kuala Lumpur was told on Monday that the country's Anti- Corruption Agency (ACA) was investigating whether there was any wrongdoing when the outspoken member of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's cabinet approved the allocation of 1.5 million shares in Universal Holdings Bhd, a listed Malaysian company. Opposition members of parliament suspect she approved the shares for a relative named Fazrin Anwar Nor.

We will have to wait for the outcome of the probe, but just the news that a member of parliament had the boldness to raise that question -- much less the ACA's probe into the allegations -- must have sounded unbelievable for many of us here.

Indonesia's own anti-graft campaign has yet to produce significant results although it has been in effect for decades.

In a seminar on effective ways to combat corruption held at the National University here several years ago, a high-ranking official, who had shocked the nation with his anti-corruption crusade when he was a provincial judge, told the meeting that "we do not need to hold this seminar to find an effective system to combat corruption, all we have to do is copy the one implemented in Malaysia".

The experts present seemed to agree to his idea but the problem was: "After you get the bell from the neighboring country, which of the mice will be brave enough to hang it around the corrupt cats' necks?"

Malaysia is not necessarily squeaky clean as far as malfeasance goes, but its campaign for honest government has been effective.

What we know of the anti-graft doings in our neighboring country is the success made possible by the sincerity of the political leaders and the participation of the people, who actively enforce their right to demand honesty and ethics of the civil service. The leaders there believe that corruption is not only an immoral breach of the people's faith, but also a dangerous destabilizing factor in relation to both the nation's political system and economy. Unlike the people of some developing countries, Malaysians do not believe that corruption is a part of the national culture, but rather see it as a moral Human Immunodeficiency Virus.

No Malaysian official would dare to flaunt the fruit of corrupt behavior like bureaucrats in some other countries do. In Malaysia, as in other countries where anti-graft campaigns are supported by open, democratic systems, corruptors hide their behavior as long as they can.

The problem is that even in countries where individual citizens can function as guards against corrupt behavior, unscrupulous people in places of public trust have become more adept and sophisticated in their methods of malfeasance. They have successfully cultivated the art of cover-up and of preventing jealousy among their colleagues, or neighbors, despite their sudden jump in social status due to wealth accrued from graft.

But, unlike in Malaysia, where the populace actively conducts social censorship, people living in some other developing countries have become so pragmatic about corruption as to have accepted it as a matter of course and adapted themselves to it.

This trend is just as dangerous as turning a blind eye to the fact that HIV and AIDS are a danger to everyone. It is time we came to understand that corruption is an Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome of the soul and is just as dangerous to a nation's integrity as AIDS is to human life.

Indonesia is now undertaking a drive to prevent AIDS from gaining further inroads among our populace by actively involving our health and social services and non-governmental organizations. Isn't it time that we applied the same kind of energy to healing our bureaucracy?