How often have you found yourself trailing impatiently behind a lumbering taxi on the very day you are horribly late for an appointment?
How often have you, in a fit of anger, found a break in traffic to finally overtake your tormentor, whipping around in your driver’s seat to give him a cold, hard stare that packs a punch, only to find a painfully old, grey-haired senior citizen, hunched over the wheel as he struggles to see the path ahead of him.
I remember an old, hobbling tea lady at my workplace years ago, pushing a trolley laden with cups, pots of hot tea and hot coffee to our cubicles every morning and afternoon like clockwork. She was someone’s grandmother – she talked about her “cucu” often enough – and it was sad beyond words that she still had to work day in, day out to put food on the table even as she battled with diabetes. When she died of the disease, the sadness was overwhelming.
My sister’s part-time maid, bed-ridden for a month by a painful stitch in her side, diagnosed as sciatica, showed-up at her gate one day, ready to work. Brushing aside my sister’s concerns for her health, she said bluntly: “I need the money.” Caring for her granddaughter, and saddled with an unemployed adult son, her instinct for survival forced her out of bed every morning in search of a decent income.
The reality that times are so hard that senior citizens have to keep working to support their families is hard to take in. These old men and women, should be watching their favourite drama on telly or having friends over for tea or reading a good book as their grandchildren play at their feet, not putting in long hours behind the wheel, pushing trolleys or mopping floors so bills can be paid, debts reduced.
The Goods and Services Tax does them no favours. Nor the slump in oil and gas prices. Or the end to precious subsidies on everyday items.
Yet this generation of hardworking Malaysians deserve a salute for their resoluteness. No easy way out for this bunch – many will continue to work till the very day they drop dead – like that diabetic tea-lady.
Not so for the more “adventurous” few who find creative ways to supplement their incomes.
Why bother scouting for a second job to make ends meet when squirrelling away money from the company’s coffers is ultimately more advantageous? When a secret handshake on a multi-million ringgit deal translates into a top-of-the-line model of your favourite car, or a holiday abroad with the family or renovation works for your house being “taken care of”? What’s a few thousand here and there that the company won’t even notice considering the mind boggling profits it rakes in every year anyway?
This year alone, the number of top officials in GLCs being investigated for corruption for millions, is shocking. The numerous Auditor-General’s reports on wastage by the ministries overseeing government hospitals and public schools is equally outrageous. So much taxpayers’ money frittered away on bloated contracts to choice suppliers.
Mind you, it is not only in the government sector where corruption is widespread. The private sector is rife with “enterprising” corporate figures in sleek suits and shiny shoes, who use their creativity in conference rooms to not only bump up the company’s profits but ensure their pockets are lined in the process too.
This year has been an illustrious year for Malaysia, considering we made a name for ourselves on a global scale as a country adept at being corrupt.
In a TIME article dated March 17, Malaysia took second place after Brazil, and before South Africa, China and Russia for the world’s most corrupt countries.
Speaking at a press briefing early this year, at the release of Transparency International’s 2015 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), TI-Malaysia President, Akhbar Satar called on the government to urgently implement various measures to completely eliminate corruption. He said this in light of Malaysia suffering a significant drop from 50th place in 2014 to 54th place last year – way to go, Malaysia!
To all the average Joes and Janes out there who continue to slog your way through the year, taking on second jobs or selling kuih-muih at roadside stalls, or becoming part-time electricians and plumbers, thank you for showing the younger generation what it means to earn an honest day’s work.
To the many who thumb their noses at hard work and seek the easy way out by turning to corruption, shame on you. Your happiness will be short lived. The humiliation you will feel on being found out – as you most certainly will someday – is certainly not worth the superficial and dishonest life of luxury you have built for yourself today.
When all’s said and done, integrity, honesty, ethics and humility are way better “luxuries” to walk away with in your one life on earth.
Here’s to a blissfully corruption-free 2017.
Emma Black is an FMT reader.
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