WHISTLEBLOWERS TO THE RESCUE! Kyankwanzi Peasant Tells Museveni How to Crush Corruption Using Village Informers
Open Letter to President Museveni!
Dearest Sir,
As is right, I’ll start by thanking our dear leader for finally putting on your boxing gloves to punch corruption. For years, citizens were gossiping that you only bark. But by biting the mighty Triple A, you showed the nation you’re a lion that doesn’t bark, but rather roars. And one roar of a lion is far greater than one million barks of a dog.
The news of her troubles found me in my maize garden in the little-known village of Kigambanankwale in Kyankwanzi District. You see, when I am working in the garden, I take along my ka-radio, which entertains and updates me as I labour. The previous season, drought hit us hardest and the price of maize was down; so you can imagine the injustice. We peasants were wondering how one Ugandan could buy a car costing Shs3.4 billion to add to her fleet of other expensive toys.
Curious as I was, I dropped my hoe and called my area MPs to be sure they weren’t part of her gang. You see, the radio presenter didn’t say which MPs were involved. Worryingly, my MPs’ phones were off, which worried me even more. However, I checked with “my sources” and several other radio stations to confirm who was against the Republic.
Scrolling through the various stations brought back memories of the early 1980s during the NRA war when I was still a young boy. Whenever my father heard of an important hit your warriors had made, he and his friends would check with various radio stations to confirm if it was true. Of course, Radio Uganda never broadcast your victories; it was always the BBC, KBC and other foreign broadcasters. But thanks to the freedom of information you have given us, the whole nation learnt of the greedy gang’s calamities locally.
Your Excellency, when you spoke against corruption during the swearing-in, the nation didn’t wholly expect that you were dead serious. Most people even thought the corrupt were more powerful than you. Little did we know that, as a strategist, you were psychologically preparing us. I think Your Excellency didn’t want to cause heart attacks and pressure.
By the way, Your Excellency, accept my warmest congratulations upon being sworn in to lead us once again. Congrats, congrats, and more congrats.
After Nalongo Triple A, we now believe you’re gearing up to arrest the other big sharks of corruption. Mbu, there are a lot of them in the ministries. Our leader, don’t worry; the whole nation is behind you. And they’re scared. I heard they’ve even started practising for life in coolers. Mbu, they now sleep on bare floors or small mattresses in their bedrooms in preparation for the cold prison concrete floors.
Mr President, you’ve finally shown what the term Kisanja Hakuna Mchezo means. I heard the corrupt no longer ask for kintu kidogo, pen fees, or even ask victims whether they are from Full Pocket or Empty Pocket villages.
Naively, until this drama, I didn’t think a smartly dressed leader of the calibre of a Speaker who even meets the Pope regularly could engage in corruption. She seemed innocent and spoke so convincingly, as if she were patriotic. Kumbe, she was the number one robber of the nation… eh! I hear rooms full of money were found in her various homes. Money that could have been used to construct roads in Kyankwanzi. I heard you need volunteers to count her loot.
All said, you have demonstrated the best leadership. If it were Amin, Triple A would be talking from the dungeons, but you have let her stay in her house, even enjoying her big mattress.
Ssabalwanyi, for far too long, bean weevils in government offices have been taking advantage of loopholes in the law and manipulating government systems to defraud the nation. It’s only in Uganda where government employees who are paid little money are far richer than people in the business community who earn the same amount over the same period. It is common to find a Community Development Officer or medical officer who takes home less than one million shillings each month constructing a posh building while his children attend expensive schools.
If there wasn’t something fishy about their sources of income, they would have shared their secret of financial management with government and made Ugandans the richest people in the world.
Mr President, from my vantage point and in my peasant’s opinion, if you want to successfully fight the corrupt, I suggest you use the old NRA tactic of having contacts in every village. All over the country, people see many suspicious developments involving government officials, but they do not have safe channels through which to report them. This prompts me to suggest that you order your ICT gurus to create an easy-to-use whistleblower app through which citizens can anonymously report suspicious incomes and developments involving public servants.
To avoid wasting precious time and resources, the app would require the user’s GPS location and phone contact before he or she submits information regarding suspicious developments surrounding a government employee.
Lots of corrupt officials are hiding their loot in real estate. They construct buildings, buy houses and bibanja. Wananchi know them all. Through the app, if one person is reported by several people or linked to several properties that do not tally with their income, GISOs would be tasked to secretly investigate them. If the allegations are true, that servant of the nation would automatically qualify for a chat with the anti-corruption team to share his secret of economics.
In a bid to rid the nation of bean weevils, once someone is indicted, government should confiscate their properties. If convicted, government would sell or utilise the properties to try and recover taxpayers’ money. After all, it’s our money. That, I hope, would itself deter many would-be corrupt officials. At that point, the anti-corruption team would give a financial reward to the whistleblower.
Lastly, Fountain of Honour, I pray that you order the registration of all bibanja countrywide. In that system, each kibanja would be given a unique NIN.
I remain your patriotic peasant,
Rukidi Rwakasimbi
Kigambanankwale Village
Contact: 0752653030
Email: Atwookirrr@gmail.com
Facebook: Rukiidi Rwakasimbi
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