Consequences of Corruption

I do not support the notion that the advocates of puritanical societies are mere pretenders.

I personally resisted temptations to line my pockets as a government medical officer.

My audible criticism of medical quackery....and refusal to give and accept kickbacks for referrals have all made me tons of enemies.

Corruption comes in many forms and guises. Standing against it comes with a lot of consequences.

I see myself as intentionally opting for the arduous path.

The country is doomed to failure and ruin if we continue this way. If I can persist in a honest trajectory in a state of abject pennilessness, many of our rulers and their followers are more financially equipped to do so.

A former medical director of mine travelled out of town, leaving the entire hospital and its finances in my care for 2 months. A friend who was nagging me to steal the hospital blind was later sacked from the banking industry...for stealing.. He now hauls loads on the decks of ships at Apapa wharf. He tells people he does clearing and forwarding!

When I attend job interviews and asked if I would pay or collect kickbacks, I tell them to choose between a correct answer and a honest answer. My honest answer is... I wouldn't! Those who refuse to employ me on that score often complain later that their employee doctors engage in stealing hospital property.

So, dishonesty also comes at a huge cost!
But you seem to forget that in most of these Asian nations, they view corruption with such severity that it carries the death penalty. They are not just accepting it as a fact of their daily routines, they are dealing with it squarely!

Medical quackery causes needless deaths, kickbacks in medical practice compromises standards and leads to avoidable injuries and death to patients, stealing of public funds makes people impoverished, promotes robbery and social insecurity, a drivers license corruptly obtained causes needless vehicular accidents, corruption at the building approval authority causes collapse of buildings and death... The list is endless.

Survival... Survival... Survival... That brings me to the matter of the very essence of life. Or the very essence of survival.

The unsentimental reality of the absence of any God or supreme being must lead us to the realisation that all the writings of the religious books of reference are mere fiction, save for some of their historical contents and admonitions for good comportment.

If the above submission were true, then, we must harbor no doubts that life is vain.

Then, what is the essence of survival if not to better the lives of fellow humans, bring smiles to their faces and generally leave planet earth better than we met it when we die.

This is particularly important as application of wisdom makes us realise that a mindset of selfishness and dishonesty by us all can only result in the destruction of nation states, continents and even the entire planet.

It does not matter if your good gesture is not reciprocated by other humans.

The worst case scenario is that one would die in the process. ...but I ask... Is a dead man in a position to appreciate his material possessions, his power, his connections, his influence or even the life he just forfeited?

And it would amaze you that many other persons share these schools of thought. There are so many others.... even within our police establishment...

For the advocates of corruption, their school of thought is about individual survival without giving much thought to collective or even global survival.

If the whole collapses, how can any of its individual entities possibly survive?

How can a part survive in spite of the demise of the whole?

Dr Tosin Akindele is a medical practitioner and public affairs analyst.