A joke did the rounds a year ago about how President Robert Mugabe summoned the Services Chiefs to State House to find out how they were doing and what could be done to boost the morale of the uniformed forces.
The Commander of the Defence Forces intimated that salaries were low and his guys were badly demoralised; they needed something to cheer them up, such as an annual bonus.
The Commissioner of Prisons said almost the same adding his guys had done a good job keeping all those MDC malcontents locked up with the lice. A festive season bonus would just do the trick, he said.
But Police Commissioner-General Augustine Chihuri remained eerily silent.
The Old Man in his wry humour asked him: “Ko vaChihuri, ndeipi?” (What have you got to say for your guys, Chihuri?) Upon which the top policeman cleared his throat and said: “Don’t worry Chef, my guys know what they gotta do.”
Now the cat is finally out of the bag.
“Mapurisa, mapurisa, mapurisa,” boomed Mugabe at the official opening of the Zanu PF conference in Gweru on Friday.
When a word of reprimand is repeated thrice, the gravity of the offence becomes clear.
Mugabe described how police roadblocks are set up so as to extort money from the motoring public, saying some drivers were asked to pay as much as US$200 as a bribe to policemen for imagined vehicle defects.
He told the police: “We want you to be straightforward people. You are representatives not only of government, but of the people as a whole.”
It was high time.
Surveys have shown that the Zimbabwe Republic Police is the most corrupt police force in the region. The Anti-Corruption Trust of Southern Africa only last week reported on how Zimbabwean traffic police officers have become as brazen as to ask for bribes in public.
The report says some policemen had become inexplicably stinking rich overnight. They own fleets of omnibuses and houses in suburbs normally deemed to be for the very rich.
Disturbingly, the officers, the report says, share the proceeds of their nefarious activities with their superiors back at their Head Office. Those who choose not to, are reportedly victimised by being transferred to less lucrative posts.
Excerpt from:
Zimbabwe: Graft – Good Words, Well-Spoken Gushungo