By Samuel Estefanous
estefanoussamuel@yahoo.com
Naturally being a lawyer your chances of coming across ‘scum bugs’ of all sorts on a regular basis is tenfold greater than that of the ordinary citizen. So I will try not to make a mountain out of a molehill. In other words I will try to limit my views to ‘reported cases’ of public knowledge.
Tolls, Highway robbers and Kickbacks
I pity long distance truck drivers hauling basic commodities, medicine, gas, fertilizer and other necessities of life. We all know what it means when trucks are stranded along the Addis-Djibouti highway for a single day- the major artery of the economy clogs.
It breaks any person’s heart to listen to the woes of these drivers all over the country. In desperation their Association has begun publishing reports of the list of ‘the missing, the wounded and the murdered on duty’ in a given period of time.
The government of PP has done a good job of capitalizing on EPRDF’s initiatives of modernizing the network of toll highways. That is too obvious to miss. Few complain of paying the official toll even after the amount is tripled or quadrupled in a few years’ time considering the time, gas, wear and tear the super advanced road networks save.
The thrill and beauty of long distance travel ends there.
Every ten or fifteen kilometers you are told to pull over. The drivers know the routine demands by heart-license, registration, third party, roadworthy certificate and as of late fire extinguisher and medical kit. The demand for fire extinguishers and the medical kit have been exploited for such a long time as drivers denied the cops and road transport supervisors any ground to exact kickbacks by ensuring 100% compliance.
Somehow they make you pay-compliance or no compliance that is. They would say something like ‘the windbreaker is scratched’, though you need a magnifying glass to find one. Pass that and they would look you up and down and inquire ‘why are you sweating…?’ That is what they would like to know. Imagine being queried about being sweaty in the middle of the rift valley while facing a ruthless uniformed officer determined to rob you of your per diem to the last penny.
‘Chewing Khat, aren’t we?’, it would be concluded unilaterally and you will be slapped five thousand birr just like that. You might protest as much as you like saying you never tasted the leaf on medical or religious or moral grounds. You will be laughed at. ‘The choice is all yours five thousand birr in cash or ten thousand birr with receipt’. You forget everything, settle for the five grand and timidly ask if the road ahead is ‘navigable’. You will be told ‘nothing new, take care as the driving is at your own risk as usual’ you will be advised.
From here on only prayer and your guardian angels are your ultimate sureties. If luck isn’t on your side, any time the dreadful and dreadlocked bandits could ambush you. Their style is merciless. They shoot and ask the question afterwards. What makes them cheap is they try to latch a semblance of political motif to their laziness, barbarity and greed. They have zero political agenda. Absolutely nothing, nada! They just hate to earn an honest living.
Hijacking License for Ransom
The recent scandal at the Ministry of Labour and Skills is nauseating, isn’t it? To begin with the alleged crime was orchestrated by high ranking officials. What makes such crimes creepy is the position of the perpetrators.
The abuse and breach of TRUST makes one lose confidence in the very fabric of public services. Imagine the government going all the length doing background checks, sounding out solidarity inclination, attitude and most important of all the impossibility of crossing the corruption redline before letting the personage assumes the position and bingo ‘his excellency’ happens to be a smooth operator of the corruption fatal cancer. Talk of the seamless configuration of corruption and ethnic politics!
I am glad the investigation team was zooming in on the ill-gained property to get to the criminals. Sometimes innocent hapless rookie ‘members’ of some obscure committee might be cleverly ‘mixed’ in the scheme and get hurt suspected of aiding and abetting.
What makes this particular alleged crime a threat to national security is the brutality of the method employed by the suspects. For God’s sake they are holding legitimate licenses hostage and demand ransom harming the economy, employment and multitudes of government plans among others in the process.
Stealing from the Sick and Vulnerable
Primarily WFP intervenes and operates to manage emergency situations where threat to livelihood is imminent and human life is at stake. They are almost like first respondents. They are always functioning under stop watch to save lives.
So it beats any rational person to understand when a bunch of sweaty fat jerks conspire to divert WFP funds earmarked to save the lives of malnourished nursing mothers and their kids (in an effort to reduce infant mortality in the country). According to reports that is what government employees in the newly founded South-West Regional State did. Allegedly they misappropriated funds to buy a nearly 400,000.00 birr smartphone apiece by starving malnourished children to death.
Thank God authorities were able to track down and apprehend them.
Plea-bargaining with the Wrong Party
There is nothing wrong with the concept of plea bargaining in criminal justice proceedings. Let us face it proving guilt beyond a shred of doubt has increasingly become difficult nowadays as the criminals are well informed, tech savvy, educated and commit the crime with the help of professional propping every step of their planned and coordinated endeavors.
So it saves prosecutors a lot of effort to give a degree of concession to pin guilty verdict on suspects at least on some of the offences. The method has proven worth the while in Ethiopia as well after the system was introduced recently.
The problem here is for the most part folks are doing the plea bargaining not with the institution of justice administration but with the members of law enforcement in their individual capacity. I hate to admit it but it is God’s honest truth that some lawyers are acting like the go-between in these disgusting underhand dealings, flagrantly breaching the oath they have undertaken when embarking to practice law.
God Bless
Editor’s Note: Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
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