Emmanuel D Tayari:
During the election time, we always speak ill of politicians and even
various policies that they have put forward. Ethics play a great role
on how people analyze how politicians have used their roles for
personal gain or misconduct. However, firstly let us ask ourselves,
what is the relationship between ethics and politics? Ethics and
Politics are similar as both are concerned with protecting the
society’s prosperity: Ethics choose what is best for us to enjoy a
healthy life, while politics organize the best social life possible.
This means that these two are interrelated and you cannot create a
prosperous society without having both.
The other question to ask ourselves is; what makes the politicians
have a bad reputation? In fact, most people are very good especially
the ones with good intentions, but unfortunately most people also are
unwilling to comply with proper ethics. In any case they are human
beings with their strengths and weaknesses. It is more clearly looming
in the public arena; and we cannot forgive the slightest mistake when
the politicians are unethical. Most of the Politicians grab all he/she
can with great skill and forgets that he/she is a human being and
treats others as mere objects. This type of politicians with broad
minds that are manipulative end up as leaders and politicians with bad
reputations of which unfortunately most of such leaders exists in most
parts of the world today and our country is not an exception.
Perhaps the biggest mistake of our politicians, including those who
have promoted important public work is the lack of Empathy. They have
forgotten to practice empathy, which is based on the Christian
principle “do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself,”
and that is why they always end up in corruption scandals.
While it is true that in the democratic system, everyone has the right
to elect and be elected I think this year it is about time we come to
the conclusion that, the right leaders have to be ethical politicians.
As we are heading to the elections at the end of this month, it is
good to remember that; times are hard. The financial collapse of the
most powerful country in the planet has caused unknown effects on the
global economy, and, of course, these effects are more prevalent in
underdeveloped countries like ours, where the price of everything has
gone up. It is important to underscore that while we are trying to
recover, we have no place for lack of honesty by politicians which is
another financial crisis by itself
When people involve themselves in corruption without feeling
obligated, it makes one ask him/herself if democracy really exists.
One of the most common criticisms of democracy is that; it alleges
that ignorance of citizens about the political, economic and social
rights in a society is a reason that hinders them to a rational choice
between various proposals. This ignorance would make the decisions of
people wrong in most cases. However, democracy advocates that people
are not ignorant, and blames that kind of criticism that it has
interest in putting the powerful classes and the technocratic
authoritarianism to the interests of the people.
This argument is often put forward also by politicians to discredit
the legitimate elections and referendum and its contexts in which
reforms pose for deepening democracy towards more participatory forms
of direct or representative democracy. Moreover, the political class
can be whoever promotes the ignorance of citizens to achieve personal
goals. To avoid this circumstance there are laws requiring government
to devote part of its assets to provide information to the public
through official bulletins on new legislation or through the
publication of decisions on judicial decisions, or by raising the
public awareness before any election or referendum.
In any case, in all societies in which public debate is possible, it
is assumed that democracy is the least bad political system, as always
entails a certain acceptance of government by the people having been
elected by it.
You can also argue that ignorance leads to abstention in elections. I
n the future It would be rational to increase the funding to
educate the electorate on how to choose good leaders. Moreover, it is
something of which in the long term we can help to avoid absenteeism
in the elections by incorporating the election education in our Civic
Education which is taught in secondary schools. Thus as we have seen
politics and ethics go hand in hand and that they have to be carefully
looked into and considered in the whole election process to bring
about the required democracy and the attainment of well deserving
leaders.
Emmanuel D. Tayari
Mobile: +447594707524
Email: e.tayari@tanzaniawealth.com