The driver instructs the conductor to go and deal with the officer. Money changes hands out of view of the passengers – or so the police officer thinks. Many Zimbabweans suspect, with good reason, that money discreetly exchanged between traffic police officers and kombi drivers goes straight into the pockets of the young cops, who live comfortable even extravagant lives notwithstanding the fact that they earn less than $200 a month.
Traffic police officers are envied by their colleagues in the police force as the road is regarded as a feeding trough.
Ordinary people are jealous of the personal wealth of the police officers who, in short periods of time, are able to acquire personal property such as cars and residential stands. Such wealth that is far beyond the imagination of many Zimbabweans.
Traffic police officers are festooned along the countrys major roads, and only by their mercy do kombi drivers and even ordinary drivers survive. Along Chitungwiza Road a kombi is bound to be stopped at several roadblocks. Tickets are dispensed, but not always, as it is more prudent for the kombi drivers to offer bribes than for them to pay the $20-plus fine, which is the penalty for those on the wrong side of the law.
We are stopped at least twice along Chitungwiza Road. We are made to pay $20 for offences that range from overloading, which depends with the police officers, to speeding, which is recorded on speeding machine. The fine is $20, which is too much considering that on an average trip we only make $19. As a result we end paying small bribes that range from $3 to $5.
This will guarantee our passage and also saves us from the paying the $20, said a driver. However, paying bribes to one fat police officer does not ensure that one would pass through the same roadblock without being stopped, as the police take turns to man the roadblocks. Police officers are milking passengers and kombi drivers can attest to that. Their
flamboyant lifestyles are also testimony of the fact that there are using unorthodox means to add to their small salaries.
Senior police officers have smelled the coffee and have introduced a lifestyle audit to target police officers from the rank of constable to assistant inspector, who will be asked to give an account of their wealth.
But the audit, to be conducted quarterly, does not include senior police officers. Police officers who fail to explain their wealth would be forced to appear before a disciplinary board. Police Spokesperson Assistant Commissioner Wayne Bvudzijena told the state media that indeed the police had launched the audit and said it was standard procedure meant to curb corruption.
It is a procedure done throughout the police force to check if officers lifestyles tally with what they earn. These are some of the mechanisms that we have in place to curb corruption within our structures as our members carry out their duties, said Bvudzijena. Police officers in the country are filthy rich. They send their children to elite schools, And when they fall sick they go to expensive hospitals.
The disciplinary action against those found on the wrong side of the law will be taken according to their wealth. Others will have to be suspended or dismissed as determined during the hearings, said Bvudzijena. Members of the public in the country have called upon the police chiefs to be severe, but they are sceptical that the police can police themselves.
I would like to see a clampdown on corruption in the force, but I am not sure whether there is a genuine will among the chiefs, as they have also benefited from corruption. There are aware of corruption but do nothing about it, said a former
police officer.
Only last year police chiefs ordered that traffic police officers around Harare to undergo lie-detector tests in a move that was designed to weed out corrupt elements. The results were never made official. Villagers in remote parts of the country such as Muzarabani accuse the police of demanding bribes in order to give livestock clearance letters. They charge $10 per beast.
The Anti Corruption Commission is still to be given form and the government seems to lack the political will to make it happen. The Minister of Finance Tendai Biti recently said there was need to address corruption from the roots. You need to deal with the structural issues that are at the epicentre of corruption. We need to deal with the corruption drivers, said Biti.
Another cabinet minister, Henry Madzorera, who is in charge of the Health Ministry said, Corruption is everywhere among civil servants, including the police and elsewhere. In its report for January 2011, Advocacy and Legal Advice Centre (ALAC), a project for Transparency International, called upon the government of Zimbabwe to institute tougher and stricter laws to guard against looting of state property by civil servants.
The government should respond to the grave results published in the Comptroller and Auditor Generals report by establishing monitoring mechanisms and ensuring compliance to curb the looting of state resources by public officials, said
ALAC.
Post published in: News