Behind every graft, there is a woman adding fuel to fire

In the run-up to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the good Lord was angered by the level of corruption in the two towns.

Of course we might look at that corruption as different in that it was issues of morality that so angered God, but that is what corruption is all about — the attack on our moral standing.

If we were living in those days, Nairobi, Mombasa, Kisumu, Nakuru, Eldoret and other major towns in Kenya would have been burnt many times over.

But how did we get here? Kenya was known for her hard working and proud citizens. It was known for individuals who would find some things “beneath” them so much, they would get extremely offended if you offered them bribes.

FINE, THERE WERE CORRUPT INDIviduals, but by and large the community shunned corruption. In those days, Kenya’s economy was growing, while the economies of Uganda, Somalia and Ethiopia were falling; Tanzania’s was slumbering away.

Hard work was the mantra and people frowned upon lazy bones and the “get-rich-now” mentality.

Crippling corruption started in early 1980, reaching levels of concern in mid 1980s. It was the time politicians started telling us to “eat” but vote with our conscience — as though that were possible.

Cases of employees being charged with stealing by servant started being highlighted. “Chai” in the police became more pronounced, particularly on the road.

The first group to react was the private sector. And the first to be targeted were male cashiers. Companies started employing female cashiers with the “knowledge” that rarely did you find a female cashier in court with charges of embezzlement.

But the need for “crossing the valley of poverty” became more and more self-driven. The focus shifted from ready cash to latent cash, the arena of supplies and purchasing.

Virtually all the supplies and purchasing offices I was then dealing with were populated by male officers. But in a very systematic operation, organisations started replacing the male officers with female ones, arguing that female officers were less corrupt.

What most people did not then take into consideration was that there were very few female managers.

We know the reality now. The number of female officers being arraigned in court over scandals has risen exponentially.

I started to note a strange phenomenon; some of the female officers who replaced the purchasing managers were worse in terms of demanding bribes compared to their male counterparts.

In the company I was then working with, the policy was not to pay bribes. Managers we had worked with for years had come to accept that they would get nothing from us, and would therefore not demand it, anyway.

The new female managers were a different breed. We were forced to abandon some accounts.

On a personal level, I also noted some very strange behaviour with females. Any time I was driving (and this is up to today), and I had a female passenger — whether a friend or relative — and we were confronted by a police officer, the female companions nudged me to “pay something”, saying the police officer will otherwise “waste our time”.

Any time I tell an officer to charge us, the level of disappointment on female faces is palpable. On the other hand, quite a number of my male passengers have been unperturbed about me going to court.

I did studies to find reactions of women in situations where corruption is expected to rear its head. I found that women were more willing to pay to have their children, relatives or friends employed.

WHEN IT COMES TO THE BIGGEST driver of corruption in business, the shocker is that businesswomen are more than willing to bribe to get business.

The meteoric rise of some businesswomen can be traced to this. Nothing will stop them from getting the contract. “Ten per cent” is the order of the day.

Roles have reversed, and the saying that “behind every successful man there is a woman” has acquired a totally grave meaning. It is now common knowledge that some of the mega corruptions were prompted by wives who admonish their husbands to be “clever like other men”.

Indeed, if KACC was really working, many men would become both mother and father in some families, as their wives would be in jail.

Women’s role as the “voice of reason” needs to be restored in the war against corruption.

The writer, a social scientist, is a university lecturer in management.