Basil Jarrett | Disincentivising corruption

OCTOBER 1989, and the Jamaica College football team is in the middle of a barnstorming run in the Manning Cup competition. Heavily fancied to win it all, no ‘College Man’ would dare miss a match as we beat opponent after opponent. One Saturday afternoon, a 14-year-old Basil Jarrett and two classmates alighted from the number 15 bus in Cross Roads and made their way to the old Stadium East field to see the boys in blue from Old Hope Road. Jose Marti High School was our designated victim that afternoon, and the only question was how wide our margin of victory would be.

As we approached the stadium, we noticed a number of our schoolmates had breached the stadium wall and were hurriedly making their way through the small hole, scampering off into the crowd to avoid the 50 cent admission fee. I was in my new acid-wash jeans, and as much as the thought of getting it dirty while going through the fence made me a bit nervous, the sight of so many people beating the system was just too much to resist. Eagerly, I joined the throng of gatecrashers, crawling on my belly into the venue, smiling all the while at avoiding the line and being able to now buy an extra sky juice with the money saved. Adrenaline engulfed me as I brushed off my pants and proceeded to meld into the crowd, safe from the searching eyes of stadium security.

And that’s when I noticed that in the excitement of the act, I had ripped open my jeans in the most conspicuous of places. Excitement turned to dismay as I walked through the grounds, trying to cover my exposed bottom while pretending to delight in what we had just done. Seconds later, dismay turned to utter depression as we discovered that admission to the match was completely free, as the gates were as wide open as that freshly minted tear in my jeans. Having needlessly destroyed my good pants, I learnt the awesome power of peer pressure that day and how hard it is to do what’s right, especially when others are doing what’s easy.

Thirty-two years later, that lesson is still relevant as the country grapples with one of the highest corruption indices in the region. How did we get here? After all, we have always taught our kids to do the right thing, that crime doesn’t pay, and that honesty, like patience, is a virtue. Why haven’t we been able to shake ourselves loose of this ‘beat the system’ mentality, especially when successive governments have invested so heavily in anti-corruption advertising and PR campaigns. The solution is by no means simple, but perhaps one place to start looking is at removing the incentives to beating the system in the first place.

You see, corruption is driven by incentives and wherever the benefits of corruption outweigh the risk of being caught. By removing layers of bureaucracy and government red tape which reduce efficiency and provide excuses for corruption, government can become leaner, more agile and more efficient. While there may be some debate as to what extent government efficiency actually reduces corruption, there is evidence to suggest that reduced person-to-person contact between public-sector officials and individuals reduces the likelihood of interference with regulated and standardised processes, diminishes the risks emanating from discretionary decision-making, and levels the playing field for all concerned. Speedier transactions, reduced costs and greater transparency can also reduce the temptation or justification for corruption, making the risk much less worth taking. In that regard, COVID presented an opportunity for the government to streamline and improve its processes by moving certain services online. It will be interesting to see what lessons were learnt coming out of this experiment.

By no means am I suggesting that by simply becoming leaner and more streamlined, we will rid government business of corruption. Rather, I am recommending that we widen the scope of our corruption-prevention activities beyond media pronouncements, ad campaigns, and written policy statements and codes of ethics on our websites, to include improving business and operational processes that make corruption less attractive and less necessary in the first place. Strengthening government efficiency and improving the delivery of government services, however, requires greater engagement, commitment and collaboration between government, private sector and civil society. Government must engage the private sector as a resource, a partner and a customer in order to create business process-improvement strategies that improve the delivery of government services. This will not only help businesses to devise solutions with the relevant government agencies that reduce red tape and improve efficiency, but will also give government agencies a better understanding of business and individual needs, and thereby enhance their regulatory functions.

Looking back to that fateful Saturday 32 years ago, I can now blame the architects and engineers for the poor decision to locate the Stadium East gate so far from the bus stop where I couldn’t see the ‘Free admission’ sign. That single industrial design gaffe cost me a pair of jeans, some amount of embarrassment, and quite a bit of unnecessary public exposure.

Major Basil Jarrett is a communications strategist and CEO of Artemis Consulting, a communications consulting firm specialising in crisis communications and reputation management. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com, basiljarrett.artemis@gmail.com.