Know if you are one of those corrupt individuals:When corruption takes over [Archives:2003/654/Opinion]

By Iman Mohammed Al-Sifani
Corruption has now become a daily feature seen everywhere you go and has also become a major reason for the miserable conditions we are living in today. Corrupted people seem to be everywhere and are causing damage to the society and to all clean citizens who still want to live with dignity and honesty.
Indeed, corruption has become a part of our daily lives either in education, in government, in the private sector, and sometimes even at homes. Widespread corruption has resulted in tremendous damage to the society's morality and in the way we live.
In such a society where corruption is the norm, you either are an honest individual who has not been involved in corruption, or you are a corrupted person who has indulged in it, and in either way, you are still a victim of it.
Here, I will provide you with an opportunity to identify whether you are an honest or corrupted person. All you have to do is compare yourself with the personality I will explain. This will also enable you to know if others will admire your personality or not.

Typical corrupt
Just as this person wakes up from sleep, he demonstrates corruption instantly. He goes to his job late as usual, and while walking in the street, he meets a girl and attempts to harass or flirt with her by singing songs of love or trying to be appealing to her by saying sugary sentences.
Then he gets on the minibus to arrive at his work, where he forgets all about greeting his colleagues in an Islamic and well-behaved manner. Instead, all he thinks of when he arrives is whether the colleague he bribed the other day did sign on his behalf for the morning hours not to count him absent and result in deduction from his salary.
Then he sits around chatting, smoking, making phone calls, and jerking around the offices as if he has nothing to do. He seizes opportunities when finding naive citizens who want to process their paper by placing obstacles on their way through requesting more documents and signatures, etc. Unless that person pays a bribe that could be small or big depending on the person and how wealthy he looks, he may never have his work done.
Hence, as many people can't pay, they go after those 'requested' signatures and papers to spend days and weeks before having their work done. It also becomes obvious that the guy does little work on papers and files, which pile up day after day. His production level is virtually in the negative. The only thing he is good at is demanding a salary raise at the end of every month.
When noon comes, it becomes time for buying the good old qat. But how can he justify his absence? Well, a good reason is prayer. Yes, “It's my obligation as a Muslim to go for the noon prayer. No one can stop me from worshipping God.” he would say when someone asks him where he is heading. He throws the papers into the drawer, stops processing the papers of the citizen he is facing despite the citizen's pleas and begging, then along with others like him, he goes to the qat market (souq algat) and never comes back to sign the attendance sheet because he has his pall there to sign for him. No wonder why workers and their manager leave jobs early.
Our man then goes to buy qat with the bribes he collected that day. He forgets or ignores the fact that he has children to feed at home. But he also buys himself some candy and other stuff and throws the plastic covers on the street carelessly just as he does with his cigarette buds.
Finally he reaches his home, shouting “Where is my lunch?” even greeting his family.
After having an imperfect lunch he goes to a friend's house slamming the door after him to spend the whole evening chewing qat and talking bogus stuff with his friends while smoking and tattling on others.
As sunset approaches, his tempers start to deteriorate and the downfall in his mood continues until he returns back late at night, and on his way home he throws out all the remaining digested qat from his mouth in total carelessness on the sidewalk while everyone is watching -also carelessly.
That moving corrupted figure reaches his home, where he directly heads to his bed with little to care about concerning his wife, children and their education and problems. He simply lives in his own world.
Now he is in his bed to sleep or think until dawn about how to get more bribes and money the other day for a better kind of qat and for longer hours for chewing it.
In the morning, and after little sleep, he starts another day of corruption and inefficiency.

It is reality
The story may seem exaggerated or pessimistic, but it is in fact a pity that it happens for so many Yemenis living in this country.
To find out more about corruption, you can go to any famous public school or any ministry you can think of, you'll never get any thing out of their employees without bribes or a person of authority to help you out.
Corruption has a negative effect on personalities too. Children tend to learn how to be corrupt in an early stage in life, it may not be surprising if you find your child asking you for a little 'gift' before doing his homework or running an errand.
Corruption is not an illusion, it is real and it is shaping our lives in and out of our homes. Time is running out and corruption is taking control of our lives, and will destroy our future if we don't deal with it as soon as possible.
We can't say that the real reasons of corruption are parents, society, the media, etc. I believe the truth is that corruption has become so evident and spread in our lives because we have distanced ourselves from good faith in religion and have degraded moralities. We are losing our own values implanted in our culture and society, and we may end up losing our future too.
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