Conscience dead in Kenya

When Covid-19 hit, a cabal of callous crooks made a killing. They sourced inferior personal protective equipment (PPE) at inflated costs, frustrating the fight against the pandemic. Were a bit of moral sensibility injected in this enterprise, a few souls would still be alive.

However, the PPE fiasco is just the latest of a well-trodden path that has seen crooks profiting by thrusting millions of people into crutches of indigence, indignity and death.

Yet there is an eerie silence, social acceptance even, of every form of fraud. Besides, culprits sit pretty, unbothered by the disgrace and anguish they cause. All this can happen when the conscience is dead. We should be worried.

The conscience is a powerful sovereign internal legislative apparatus of rational beings. This mechanism discerns the right and wrong. It automatically triggers distress upon acts that offend established moral systems. In its absence, the sense of guilt or shame is diminished. Both guilt and shame are regulatory agents of behaviour.

Make a quick buck

So powerful, they produce a sense of inferiority and worthlessness on individuals as a response to socially distasteful behavior. If culprits were jolted by shame or guilt, their malevolent urges would be tamed.

Yet, that’s not the case. Ours is a network of avaricious, vicious, uncouth and predatory characters who will stop at nothing to make a quick buck.

Therefore, even as authorities seeks to prosecute the felons, Kenya, we need to talk. We must confess that there’s a pathological moral paralysis, especially on those entrusted with our fortunes. We need to reconstruct humane sensibilities and a society that’s anchored on morals, mercy and empathy.

Transparency should also be integrated in public dealings to afford scrutiny. It would pay, too, with a public that is civically conscious. An angry public.

[email protected] @manjis