The Cost OfDeath And Fixing The System
Kwabena Amikaketo sat in his favourite chair on his balcony, viewing the setting sun which was making way for the shadows to grow longer and soon cover his part of the world like some dark blanket.
That evening his mind was again on the efforts made by Hon. Henry Quartey, the new Greater Accra regional minister, to turn Accra into a beautiful and orderly city. He had decided to contemplate on the issues when he chanced upon comments on social media which made him resolve to contemplate rather on the cost of the death of his beloved wife and corruption in Ghana. Henry’s case will be next time.
On social media, there was a wild fire cry on government to fix the broken economy and some group led by the opposition National Democratic Congress had served notice to embark on a KumePrekodemonstration.
Kwabena lamented that even though times were hard due to the Covid-19 situation, government thought it was necessary to increase taxes to fix the broken economy.
Kwabena thought this was not fair and had always prayed that government would adopt a tax system that would spread its net wide to cover all sectors no matter how private. The pure water seller can be made to pay at most GHc1.00 a month as direct tax to the state through the biometric Ghana Card to avoid the corrupt taxman. All others can pay their taxes through the Ghana Card.
Whenever everyone is caught in the tax net, all forms of taxes could be made very affordable that people would even want to pay up for the whole year.
Every government needs money to run the economy and Ghana is not exempt. However, corruption which to Kwabena was very entrenched in the system had denied the state from getting adequate money to use on the people.
Whenever the word corruption was mentioned all point to the politicians especially those holding offices. The cost of death of his beloved wife opened the eyes of Kwabena to the deep and entrenched corruption at the base and interestingly enough it is such people on the ground who are shouting the loudest and would make up at least ninety-nine per cent of those who would embark on any demonstration to express their grievances.
Kwabena’s beautiful wife was ill, starting with an ailment which was not that death threatening, but for some unknown reasons this ailment decided not to go away even though she was being treated. After about almost a fortnight her doctor advised she go for Covid text and she texted positive. Things turned upside down at home and she was rushed to a medical facility.
On the fourth day, a nurse told Kwabena that a test was needed to be done and it would cost GHc350.00. He had to pay upfront since the text would be done in a private laboratory. Kwabena quickly paid via MoMo.
Then on the fifth day, the nurse told Kwabena that she forgot to add another test and the two were to be done together. That test would cost GHc160.00 which Kwabena again paid via MoMo.
All alone, this nurse had been assuring Kwabena that his wife would recover and be very well since worse cases had turned out good and the patients walked in better health away from hospital. There was only one young nurse who expressed worry about the state of Kwabena’s wife and asked that he prayed.
On the sixth day a medical doctor was very frank with Kwabena and asked him to pray because his wife was not in any good shape. He went to his car and made calls to all the priests he had earlier contacted. This took almost forty-five minutes. Just as he put his phone down and was driving out of the facility, the first nurse called him and informed him that he was to get some drug, nine bottles in all, which was to be administered every eight hours for three days. Each bottle cost GHc450.20. Without which his wife’s condition would worsen.
And, oh by the way he was to pick the drug from the nearby pharmacy where he was always directed to go to. This Kwabena did without thinking and by the end of the day GHc4,051.80 was gone. His wife passed on to eternity on the eighth day without being administered the full dosage of the drug, if she was even administered any at all.
Kwabena then remembered how the mortuary man, after collecting some tips from him, was blunt enough to demand GHc1,000.00 as an unofficial fee for bathing and dressing the his wife’s corpse. Kwabena paid via MoMo. He made other unofficial payments of GHc2,300.00, for he wanted his wife to have a befitting burial.
Then he went to start the process of acquiring death certificate of his wife. He encountered a young lady in the office who told him it was going to cost GHc300.00 for the certificate and later demanded GHc200.00 if he wanted express processing. In all Kwabena made payments of GHc654.00 to this lady, GHc500.00 for the death certificate and GHc150.00 for her person with GHc4.00 for charges, when in effect, the actual certified fee was GHc20.00 for a temporal certificate and at most GHc100.00 for the biometric one.
When Kwabena demanded receipt, the lady said that the department does not issue receipts. How come? A department under a state institution that receives payments on behalf of the state, does not produce receipts for payments made by clients or customers and a top director accepted this corrupt lie as the truth.
The cost of death of his beloved wife worked out to GHc8,515.80 which were monies that was fleeced down to medical personals and other officials who should have had sympathy with him, but used that opportunity to extort that sum of money from him. The medical staff knew his wife was going to die, yet went for the kill to make him pay for very costly drugs which was not used on his wife.
He was able to get his refund of GHc650.00 from the Birth and Death people, and had the certificate processed for free. Kwabena was however very shocked and angered at the corruption running very deep and high at the base of society.
All over the place corruption is in vogue. Mechanic apprentices almost got GHc600.00 from Kwabena for a spare part that actually cost GHc350.00. A trotro mate will give less than he should to a passenger who paid for the transportation and claim he has not got change. Everywhere traders, businessmen, etc. etc., will put a huge extra on the cost of their goods and services just because they want to make more profit to get rich or maintain their ill-gotten wealth.
The ripple effect is quite evident, since everyone goes to pay more than they should, they will also charge more than they should and the beat goes on. The conditions in the country becomes difficult and the politician in office is blamed.
Kwabena made some interesting analysis: Assuming there are 5,000 politicians in state office and they embezzled on average GHc1,000,000.00 each, that will be GHc5 billion lost to the state. Now assuming there are 10,000,000 ordinary citizens engaged in all manner of works, and got away with fleecing out on average GHc10,000.00 each. The state will lose GHc100 billion. So who are the course of the wrecking of the nation? The politicians or the ordinary citizens?
Kwabena quickly said to himself that he was not exonerating politicians of any guilt. Since as leaders or elders of society, they must find the means to stop this canker. They are the first to blame; so they must pass laws that will prevent any form of corruption.
And by the way where do these so-called politicians come from? From society. And what did society do when it was evident that the fellow vying for political office was a corrupt being or had wealth and resources which no one knows where he got them from.
He contemplated that assuming that young lady at the Births and Deaths who collected GHc500.00 from him for the death certificate, had 1,000 applicants coming to her in a year, she would only pay GHc100,000.00 to the state and pocket GHc400,000.00 for herself.
She then goes to her home constituency and starts some developmental projects there and catches the eyes of political gurus. She is picked to run for the seat and she wins; her party is in power and the president appoints her minister or deputy, the rest will be current affairs.
The corrupt politician comes from the very society crying out against corruption, yet breeding corrupt people. To Kwabena, the whole system needs fixing and no one has the moral right to blame a section of Ghanaians for been responsible for the mess we are in.
Artisans and mechanics will overcharge and yet do shoddy job for you to come back to them. Traders want to make more profit than is morally accepted, families connive among themselves and sell lands many times over to a prospective buyer.
Everybody wants make fast money and those who have to pay higher prices will also remember to increase the cost of goods and services they provide. And through all this there is someone who grows out to become a politician. And when he is putting into practice what he learnt from the ordinary people, we are told politicians are corrupt.
Kwabena lamented that the morality instilled in society when he was a child was all gone and lost. Now even among pastors and so called men and women of God we have the crooks and the morally inept. And now everyone wants to caste stones at the political office holders. Of course they are equally at fault in some ways but who is without sin to caste that first stone.
Kwabena admitted to himself that political office holders must rise up and above all else, get down from their high horses and go to people and interact freely with them to know their problems and how best to solve them.
First, life must be made easier for everyone so that corruption will not be necessary. Then very stringent laws must be passed to make corruption very unattractive.
In the USA for example, evading of tax or any form of financial malfeasance could land one in jail no matter who that person is. But here in Ghana, directors of some financial institutions who inappropriately use all the banks’ capital for themselves, leading to the collapse of the bank and thousands of staff put on the unemployment market, are still walking free and enjoying their loot. The politician can have such people thrown into jail with all their assets confiscated.
Kwabena Amikaketo knew that if God had decided that his lovely beautiful wife was to exit this life, there was nothing he could do about it. However the cost of her death, when some crooks in the hospitals and Birth and Death Registry could take advantage of his grief and rip him off good money, clearly shows that the country indeed needs to be fixed.
He got up and went to his room after locking the balcony door behind him and entered his bedroom, angry, sad but relieved, he laid his body on the bed to sleep.
Hon Daniel Dugan
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect The Chronicle’s stance.
The post Memoires And Lamentations Of Kwabena Amikaketo(34) appeared first on The Chronicle Online.
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