Honesty is essential in economic development

From the small practices of women in the African marketplace to the government officials in the largest nations; if dishonesty is the rule of the game there will be no growth.

Experiences in South Africa

I have just spent four weeks visiting South Africa, a country in slow decline. Crucial infrastructure fades into disrepair and unemployment reaches record levels, especially among the youth. From 2003 until now the percentage of young people out of work has gone from 35 to 50. This creates anger and frustration, resulting in crime and violence. Major South African urban centers are now dangerous areas. Why?

The World Bank points to bad exchange rates for the Rand and deteriorating public infrastructure as reasons for the lack of foreign investment. Electric power is gone more than 8 hours a day on average. It is called load-shedding, and it is as frustrating to visitors like me, as it is to people trying to go about their daily business. Other experts point to inefficient government policies and high crime rates as deterrents to economic development.

All experts seem to agree that corruption is at the center of the problem. Political corruption (graft) is endemic in South African public life. The country’s third president, Jakob Zuma, served parts of a 15-month prison sentence for corruption, before being granted an early release.

South Africa compared to the rest of the continent

It is not that South Africa is worse than other African countries in terms of dishonesty in public life. When Mwai Kibaki took over from Daniel Arap Moi as the president of Kenya in 2002, he made sure the world knew that he intended to clean up government corruption. He appointed John Githongo, an economist and former journalist, as anti-corruption czar. Githongo lasted two years in his job before he had to seek refuge in the UK.

A journalist friend, Michela Wrong wrote a book entitled It is Our Turn to Eat. In the book she chronicles Githongo´s investigations leading him to the realization that the people who profited from the graft he uncovered were the people he sat across in cabinet meetings.

It starts with our small choices

In the 90s I worked as a communications officer in an African Christian organization named African Enterprise. I wrote stories about our ministry for overseas fundraising. We built orphanages in the midst of the HIV crisis unfolding in East Africa at the time. We also built schools, planted trees, and helped local churches organize evangelistic missions.

I remember a couple of marked ladies who came to our campaign office in a small town in Kenya to show us their tin cans. They had invited Jesus into their lives the night before and told us that the Holy Spirit had convicted them of dishonest business practices.

Most rice sellers in African markets measure up rice in a tin can. They usually hammer the bottom of the tin can, so it curves inward a bit, making the measuring volume smaller, and the buyer gets a bit less rice than he or she pays for.

The marked ladies had hammered their measuring tin can bottoms flat. As Christians, they felt they had to do business with honest volumes and fair prices. I believe this is where healthy economic development starts.