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Cabinet Ministers and legislators must have declared their assets by the close of business today, a development that is in fulfilment of a constitutional provision promoting greater transparency to curb dubious wealth accumulation.
Some local politicians have been accused of abusing their strategic positions to amass obscene riches.
Stories abound of those who get elected into office with modest or no assets at all but a few months into their terms, they would have become inexplicably wealthy. In basically all cases, the asset accumulation is through corruption; politicians demanding and taking bribes to influence the awarding of tenders to some companies or using their political clout to create business opportunities for themselves or their friends.
“As enshrined in Section 198 of the Constitution, holders of public office are expected to make regular declarations of assets,” said the Minister of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Ziyambi Ziyambi.
“Legislators are expected to declare all their assets within 30 days of being appointed and sworn into office. Declarations forms are expected to be submitted by end of day this Friday 5 October, 2018. Section 198 of the Constitution which provides for regular disclosure of assets and Standing orders 49 and 48 of the National Assembly and Senate state that every member shall and not may, register all his or her financial interests in a book to be maintained under the direction of the Speaker and President of the Senate. Such registration shall be in a manner specified in the Code of Conduct for Members of Parliament. To satisfy those requirements, Parliament came up with the forms of declaration of assets. Legislators are expected to submit their declaration forms within 30 days after taking oath.”
Section 198 is one of the most progressive parts of the supreme law which will potentially help curtail dishonesty, at least among our elected officials. We say this because a legislator who declares 10 herd of cattle, a rural home and a Honda Fit as his only assets is unlikely to succumb to the temptation of engaging in shady deals to enable him to buy a double storey mansion in Borrowdale Brooke, the latest Range Rover and Toyota Land Cruiser and a fleet of haulage trucks only a year after his election as the multi-million dollar question he would have to answer convincingly is how he acquired the assets.
Chances are that the legislator or even a minister would see the possible dangers of corruption and rapid acquisition of riches and become more disciplined.
Another very important part of the law is that the politicians are obliged to declare their assets on a regular basis. It would have been a lot different if one only had to declare their wealth soon after being elected with no requirement for them to do that again more times before the next election. Regular declaration is good as it makes it easy for authorities to keep track of asset accumulation by legislators and ministers from time to time.
Anyone can declare their assets, or what they say are their assets but it is a greater idea for authorities to put in place measures to independently verify that the assets declared, particularly those that will have to be disclosed from today until the next election, are accurately identified. Those who are dishonest and know that they stole their way to affluence after today may, because they are dishonest already, not declare assets they corruptly acquired. This will be part of their efforts to hide their bad ways. For this reason, the Speaker of the National Assembly and President of the Senate might need to seek the support of other arms of the state to establish if there is no understatement of assets by the relevant people.
Doing this will keep our politicians under constant watch, thus discourage corruption. Those that are found to have hidden other properties will be challenged to explain why they would have done so. In addition to being asked to explain we recommend that such leaders be fired from their positions as their actions would suggest they lack probity.
Getting politicians to disclose their assets is helpful in addressing possible cases of conflict of interest, which is yet another positive factor. A legislator who is officially known to be a shareholder in company X may be requested to recuse themselves if, for example, a parliamentary committee is probing suspect operations at that company. If there is no public record that the MP holds shares in the company in question nothing will stop him or her from being part of the investigating team and using that position to frustrate investigations.
As Minister Ziyambi points out, Section 198 is not just about fishing out those who abuse their political offices to line their pockets. It, on the other hand, will protect those who were rich before they were elected into office and or those who legitimately get rich after their election. Our people have a tendency of thinking that every politician gets wealth because of their political positions. While this view is correct in some instances, it is utterly wrong in others. Therefore, those who run big businesses that enrich them would be protected from undue public criticism for their honestly-acquired substance if they register it.
In some jurisdictions, public officers are bound to also publicly declare their assets or interests. That takes the asset declaration agenda a step further which we support. Is it a bad idea for the hierarchy in Parliament and the politicians themselves to, in the interests of greater transparency, agree to their assets being published in the Government Gazette for example? In our view it is a good idea.
Online Reporter