Africa: Can Shs9 Billion Turn Corrupt African Leaders Into Saints?

Mr Mo Ibrahim, the founder of Celtel, has done something bold – he has established a $5m (Shs 9bn) prize for African leaders who govern wisely.

The winning presidents will get the Shs9 billion over 10 years when they leave office, plus $200,000 (Shs 370m) a year for life. The Mo Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership would be the world’s richest prize – exceeding the $1.3 million awarded by the Nobel Peace Prize.

The catch is that it will be available only to a president who democratically transfers power to his or her successor, and doesn’t cling to office. In an interview with the Financial Times, Ibrahim, said leaders had no life after office.

“Suddenly all the mansions, cars, food, wine is withdrawn. Some find it difficult to rent a house in the capital. That incites corruption; it incites people to cling to power. “The prize will offer essentially good people, who may be wavering, the chance to opt for the good life after office,” said Ibrahim.

Ibrahim, a son-of-the-soil from Sudan, made $3.4bn when he sold Celtel to MTC in Kuwait last year – probably the most money an African has made from an honest trade. And he’s the only African I know of who has given such an amount of his personal fortune to a public service cause.

As observers have noted in reality Mo is bribing African leaders to govern well, and not to turn themselves into presidents for life.

Significantly, Harvard University will assess how well the president has served his or her people while in office. Only an African could figure out all this. First, that while there are African leaders who come to power with high ideals, almost all those that cling to power do so because of their stomachs – i.e. money, and the trappings of power it brings.

Secondly, that there are few African universities that you can trust to judge the conduct of a president objectively. If the university chiefs are relatives of the president and ruling party supporters, they will give him high marks although he has done a stinking job. If they are from a rival party and a community other than the president’s, even though he performs brilliantly, they might deny him deserved marks.

For all these, however, Mo’s knowledge of the African political market – especially its price levels – is clearly rusty.

For the Mo Prize to be the “incentive” that UN Secretary General Kofi Annan says it is, it needs to be bigger than what African leaders steal from the taxpayers.

There are a few more honest leaders on the continent today, than there were 15 years ago. However, those who step down from power voluntarily or when they have served out their statutory two terms, already have the incentive to do well. For example, Nelson Mandela and Tanzania’s Ben Mkapa would have left when they did, with or without the Mo Prize.

Every corrupt African leader who has been in power for over 15 years and his henchmen and relatives, are stealing more than $5m a month. In the oil and mineral-rich countries, the presidential coterie steals about $5m a day.

For the prize to be a real temptation for the Big Men to leave office honourably and to govern well in order to qualify to be considered, the money needs to be boosted. In other words, contrary to what nearly every commentator is saying, the money isn’t enough. If it was $50m, then it would actually influence a few power-hungry rulers on the continent.

Secondly, the African Big Man is never on the gravy train alone. There are his relatives, generals, and ruling party strongmen. Any exit package must therefore be dangled before the eyes of the president and his men and women. A fatter Mo Prize could, therefore, have something for the ruling party chairman, the vice president, Army Commander and, how can we possibly forget, the First Lady! That way the whole Eating Party is taken care of.

However, if I had $5m to spend on promoting democracy in Africa, I wouldn’t use it to set up incentives for the difficult rulers to behave well because history tells us that that is rarely successful.

I would instead use it to structure punishment for bad behaviour. One possible route of attack would be to set up a Whistleblower Fund. I would pay any whistleblower in any bank or property company anywhere in the world $2m a year for 10 years, plus $100,000 a year for life for revealing a corrupt African president’s stash and homes bought with stolen public funds.

I would then put up $3m (Shs 5.5bn) for a smart law firm a year for 10 years, plus $150,000 for 15 years for it to help seize and freeze the loot, and prosecute the corrupt African president and his associates in a jurisdiction where it is possible to make hell for them.

In fact to really be effective, I would offer the money to the president’s confidantes to betray him. In addition, the squealers would receive immunity from prosecution, and get to keep their ill-gotten wealth. But then, I am not Mo.

Source- http://allafrica.com