Wednesday January 27, 2010
Integrity and good governance
IKIM VIEWS By NIK ROSKIMAN ABDUL SAMAD
Senior/Fellow Director, IKIM
Integrity should become a culture in our society. The people must have the strong conviction that corruption is evil and sinful.
THE Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) arrested 34 people including a special officer and a private secretary to two politicians for bribery involving sand mining and smuggling activities.
It is very unfortunate that corruption seems to not diminish despite various efforts by the Government to improve integrity. On the contrary, the incidence of corruption has risen. It is more shameful when most, if not all, of those involved are Muslims.
According to the National Integrity Plan, the spread of corruption, incompetence, malpractices, abuse of power, fraud and other unethical behaviour as well as the lack of work motivation, can be attributed to the decline in integrity among individuals, organisations and society at large.
Corruption undermines good governance, fundamentally destroys the integrity of the organisation. The big question is why is this happening? Why do our people not have integrity?
Integrity of an individual is the bottom line for the integrity of an organisation. It is not a question of whether you are offered a bribe or that you can easily ask for one, but rather you must have the strong conviction that corruption is evil and sinful.
It does not matter whether or not there is an opportunity for someone to take a bribe, for if integrity has been inculcated in him, then he would refuse it no matter what.
Integrity must be part of one’s principles of life and to inculcate this one must practise it from young. The noble values that our children should adopt should be included in our education syllabus.
There is a famous saying that everyone has his own price. This saying shows how one’s integrity and principles can be compromised at a given price.
Islam is a religion that condemns corruption, but sad to say corruption cases are alarming in Muslim countries. It reflects how the Muslims today do not really hold fast to the teachings of Islam.
Islam has become a ceremonial religion as well as traditional culture, rather than principles and values that serve as a guide for Muslims to lead their lives by in this temporal world.
Whereas the early generations of Islam, before they start doing anything, would first contemplate on what Islam says about it. Is it permissible? If it was fine, they would proceed.
Otherwise, they would abandon it no matter how much gain and wealth they can get from it. They have a very strong conviction that God is watching them at all times, and because of that their integrity is at its peak.
There is this famous anecdote regarding the second caliph Umar al-Khattab. He was told that milkmen tended to mix milk with water and sell not pure milk anymore. The people were not happy with that and complained to him.
So Umar issued a government circular warning that whoever mixed pure milk with water would be punished.
One night, as always, Umar disguised himself and went on his night walk to listen to the people’s complaints. When he passed by a small house, he listened to a mother and her daughter talking.
The daughter told her mother to not mix water with milk because the Caliph already warned against it. But the mother said it would be fine because Umar was not there to see them doing it.
The pious daughter replied, though Umar was not there yet Umar’s god was there watching all the time.
The daughter had reflected the highest degree of faith or Ihsan in Islam and maintained her integrity in spite of the fact that no one else was watching them.
This integrity of an individual does not suddenly emerge out of nowhere. It must be inculcated, and it takes time to develop. It must be ingrained in the heart of every single person that in a situation that challenges our principles and values and would destroy our integrity, we are ready to face it without any second thought.
No amount of money and wealth can buy our principle to not commit corruption, for our fear of hellfire is so immense, and the saying of the Prophet – “a briber and one who takes a bribe both are in hellfire” – is ringing in our ears.
Though we are living in a world full of corruption, where every day people commit corruption, we must remember that on the Day of Judgement each and every individual will be asked by God based on his personal actions, not his organisation’s.
We must be resilient. One should not imagine that one can easily get away with answering to God that one took bribes during one’s lifetime because everyone in one’s office or organisation did the same thing.
We also know that it is not possible to completely combat corruption by means of establishing procedures, laws or acts because dishonest and corrupt officials always manage to find loopholes, and easily circumvent the law.
It falls back on the individual’s integrity and his principles of life.
For a person to nurture his integrity, it must be through education and religious teachings. Good exemplary leadership of his country, community, families also serves as a motivation for one to follow their noble footsteps.
This was exemplified by the Prophet himself. He never allowed his grandchildren to take even a single date belonging to Baitul Mal.
He himself practised what he preached when he said “whichever flesh that grew due to corruption, then hellfire is more deserving for it”.
A Muslim must remember that no amount of bribes is worth taking in exchange for the hellfire that awaits those who commit the grievous sin.
If he thinks that it would be fine to take a bribe now and later repent, then he is again wrong.
For sins between human beings it is not sufficient to seek God’s forgiveness alone. He must return the money he had taken, seek forgiveness from the people he took the bribes from and also from the whole community and the people that he had victimised in the process, which is quite impossible to do.
Integrity should become a culture in our society, that anyone who has no integrity would feel so low and has no value. People with integrity can be counted on to do the right thing at all times.
In connection with this, Ikim will be organising one-day workshop on good governance on the Feb 2. The workshop will be conducted by Dr Stephen B. Young who is the Global Executive Director of the Caux Round Table, Minnesota USA, and Prof. Doran N. Hunter, a research fellow of the Caux Round Table
