Forget poverty! Corruption and misuse of power begin from school!

To Xerox Shakespeare, ‘some are born corrupt, others achieve corruption and some have corruption thrust upon them’


to most people, poverty is the number one cause of corruption and misuse of power, man’s underlying selfish desire to rise above the poverty he was born into and leave others there is blamed most on poverty, a man who rises from rugs to riches wants to devour everything that poverty had denied him, while preventing others from leaving the rugs altogether, he deprives them of the resources that would have helped them out of the rugs. But forget poverty! Corruption and misuse of misuse of power begin from school.
One man said ‘you become a corrupt citizen of this country, from the day your parent starts bribing you in the morning with money to go to school in kindergarten, from that time, a child grows up knowing, that any favour bestowed upon any one must be paid for. Of course a child going to school at that time is a favour to you the parent. And this child grows into an admirable citizen of this country, respectable in all walks, but corrupt from childhood. However this corruption and abuse of power is not natured by the money used to bribe kids to go to school in the morning. It is natured in schools, here gross misuse of power and corruption are ignored by the school authorities some even participate.
For instance the bigger boys in school who should at least channel there enormous energies into looking after the small boys, instead channel there energies in to bullying the young boys, now such a person who takes advantage of someone’s weakness gets a job as a manager, why wouldn’t that person be slapping workers, left right and centre, just because he knows they are desperate to keep there jobs so wont do anything.
Lets take another example of club presidents in schools, when there is a trip out of school, the club president will demote himself to club treasurer, he will decide who he wants to go with, those who desperately want to go will pay a higher fee than the one which was announced that they must pay., when it comes to time for elections with in the clubs, the democratic process is deeply flawed, in one of the elite schools, a club president rejected all the people who had applied for his post, just to make sure his brother replaced him as club president in this case there is corruption, where a club president charges different fees for a trip and misuse of power when he uses his position to make sure his brother replaces him as club president. It’s even worse in primary schools where teachers appoint every one but deceive the kids that they have elected them. How about if that club president became chairman electoral commission
How about prefects in secondary schools, who even have powers to Cain fellow students isn’t that abuse of power and they can Cain them for any reason as long as they think it is a reason , you can even Cain some one if you hate them. Some of these guys are not even elected anyway! in most schools, there is what is called a screening panel, this group of teachers deceives students that they consider discipline and academic performance to stop some students from competing for prefectship but it is here that teachers who have personal grudges with students settle them by removing these students, teachers who are afraid there favorite students might not be elected if it went to the ballot, make sure the opponents never make it to the final list leaving there favorite students unopposed, at the end of the day you have a list of unopposed prefects and three posts go to the vote and you wonder what the world is getting to when even the Head prefect is unopposed, just imagine the president being unopposed in a democratic country!
School administrators who forget they are holding public offices. They treat them like small principalities and themselves as small princes, talking arrogantly to parents, forgetting they are stake holders in these schools. These administrators usually forget the humbling power of a transfer, till it hits them that they have been taken to a school in a rural area.
Now if this is going on in these schools which produce the elites, that lead the country in all sectors, what will the country come to? This unchecked corruption and gross misuse of power, where a president in a club appoints his brother to replace him. and he doesn’t account for the funds used in his term of office, where teachers suffocate the democratic process, where school administrators misuse public offices, this habit embeds itself in people’s way of life and keeps its place there even when they join the army, police, URA, NGOS , politics and the rest as they are ranked in this country.
The breeding place for the corrupt and power abusers is school, democratizing schools will go a long way in ridding this country of corruption, this disease that has eaten up our society and is straining the development process, this burden that strangles our people, but unlike a burden, corruption and abuse of power were just born and will have to die at any one time

LETTER TO ABOVE!

On a certain T.V programme they showed a man crying on television when he was being beaten by a policeman, when asked he asked the policeman why he was being beaten he replied orders from above, and in his hands the man asks God for your identity promising to deal with you Mr. Above who are you.



But no one knows you, the policemen revoke your name whenever they are asked who sent them, people give jobs to the wrong people because you have ordered but no one ever says your name, people are left to speculate about your identity because no one knows how you look like, even my neighbour may be the above I am writing to.



Anyway above I want to ask you for a favour, please stop ordering policemen to cane Ugandans like that, we are also people imagine the pain of looking at a human being caning another who is going to be his senior in rank tomorrow. Do you think that man will survive being knifed when the person he caned becomes his senior?



I also wanted to tell police to stop teargasing innocent people, these days I find tears coming out of my eyes even when I am not crying and this is because I was teargased when I was passing in town a few weeks ago by one of those men who claim to have orders from you, can you imagine they even shot an innocent guard who was not rioting. Just because of your orders. Above is that what you are? Do you order people to kill others?



Another thing above, why is that competent people are denied jobs because your orders were that your cousin should get the job. I mean is it fair? My brother was the best in interviews, but how come your cousin who came last got the job, where the jobs given according to the programme in the interviews or your orders prevail over competence?

Above look at this country, in school the easiest way to get a vacancy is your order which usually comes inform of a phone call to the headmaster. Your order is all it takes for some one to be arrested for a newspaper to be closed, but look at this people don’t know, people just speculate about you and that where it ends. Not so? They will never know who you are! You are just above, no name, no phone no nothing!



Just thought I should ask you to use your order cautiously, that’s why I have written to you!

Does the pope intend to create a federal religion?

In our own country here, people have been fighting for the kind of federal they don’t know, but in the last few months that have fallen, the holy see in Rome has been bidding the Anglican faithful who are disgruntled with there church to convert to roman Catholicism he has promised to make it easy. It is easy for them to join and says he would even allow them to retain some of there Anglican traditions even though, they would still be under the Catholic Church. Does this mean ordained female priests will remain priests? Does it also, mean that married Anglican priests will be allowed to remain so? Furthermore and the greatest of all questions, does this mean pope benedict intends to create a federal religion within the Roman Catholic Church?



The history of the Anglican church has a king who was denied a divorce by a pope behind it, and this was the quarrel that led to the establishment of the Anglican church with Henry himself as head, he went on to divorce as many women as he wanted. In the time of colonialism, it was spread here in Africa by the Britons, who are the ones right now turning a deaf ear to homosexuality an abhorred vice which is causing the present split in the church, it is however surprising that the Africans who were converted are the ones taking a firm stand against homosexuality and the prelates in Canterbury are just looking on as the split becomes deeper and deeper, however pope benedict came up with an idea to bring those against homosexuality into the roman catholic church, promising them greater freedom within the church, this is almost like a federal religion within the church, and with freedoms being given to Anglican priests wont we have catholic priests converting to the federal Anglican religion within there church.



The religion which stands to gain most when Anglican church leaders in Africa and the rest of the world decide to take a stand against Canterbury is the born agains, the seventh day Adventists have not positioned themselves so well so as to gain from this deepening split within the Anglican church because for those who are stuck with a decision to leave there church and join the conservative roman Catholics, there is no way they would join another conservative church and the ever so liberal born agains seem to be gaining from the split in the Anglican church and the conservative roman Catholics.



However despite the deepening split, the prelates in England seem to be unaware of the right and are not even doing anything to bridge the gap, Rowan Williams and his comrades don’t seem to be bothered by the holy see’s call urging there faithful to join the roman catholic church, or is this stand on homosexuality a deliberate move by Canterbury to push her faithful towards the Vatican and roman Catholicism as the first step in achieving the long awaited ecumenical movement where all religions would unite under one leader, who will most definitely be the pope in Rome.