The revelations from these investigations cause heated debate and make headlines for days; members of probing committees sit in comfortable chairs with huge flasks of milky tea and crunchy meat samosas at their disposal; the investigators are paid huge allowances for their time; some are even accorded bodyguards on account of the danger they have put themselves into, owing to the barrage of tough questions they keep shooting at the subjects who shiver and shake and want to pee on themselves ,and others who give the most arrogant answers there are. Sometimes the magnitude (read: importance) of what is being investigated even gets hours of live proceedings on TV.
After days and even months of endless probing, investigating and inquiring- call it whatever you want, a 1,000-page report is compiled; it is bound in blue and yellow ribbons; journalists are invited to “capture the historic moment” as the report is handed over in a flurry of camera flashes, vigorous handshakes, practiced poses and plastic smiles. The press are fed a few highlights on the recommendations from the report; they race back to their newsrooms to let the editors decide how best to craft tomorrow’s headline, and how to script the 6 and 9pm top story.
And that’s it. Nothing comes of the endless probes, investigations, commissions of inquiry- call them whatever you want.
No one is ever brought to book; no one is ever arrested; no one is courteous enough to resign; no one is prosecuted; no one hangs their head in shame; and no one ever asks for accountability. We just drink our ginger-flavored tea, eat puffy mandazis, drink beer and sip on malwa in the bars where we all become a super analyst of sorts; devour our nsaniyas of pork, and chomp on chicken bones as we watch the news on television and shake our heads and shout about it over the dinner table, and then ruminate over it in our offices the next morning.
And public resources continue to be wasted; corruption continues to thrive; people continue to die at home and in poorly equipped health centers; others continue to walk to work; their houses are flooded when it rains; farmers continue to earn peanuts for all their toil in the sun; bridges continue to collapse; drivers continue to drive carelessly; contractors continue to do shoddy work; the wretched-forgotten continue to sleep among their goats and chickens; and their land continues to be stolen; they continue to be evicted; their police cases continue to be bungled; and they continue to make good with third-rate services.
And then there is another inquiry and life goes on.
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