Fighting the culture and practices of corruption

Sayyed Fadlullah: We need a surgical operation to reinvest all our potentials in the plans that could reproduce our nation’s reputation, the reputation that has been distorted by the corrupt who also threatened our future.

Asked in his weekly seminar the following question : How can we lay the foundations to confront the corrupt as a prelude of building an independent and welfare society?

The Religious Authority, Sayyed Muhammad Hussein Fadlullah, said:

Allah, the most Exalted, has sent His messengers to establish justice on earth. They fought a battle between the virtues of good and justice they wanted to institute on the one hand, and the corruption the tyrants invested to protect their authority on the other hand. Islam was very firm and determined in its confrontation with those who wanted to spread corruption by spreading ignorance so that the nation would not plan to dismantle the corrupt state. It emphasized that ignorance is equal to death while knowledge is life. Spreading ignorance aims at finding justifications for corruption and accepting the status quo . Islam also maintained that man is responsible, for the corruption just as he is responsible for changing it :{Corruption has appeared in the land and the sea on account of what the hands of men have wrought…}30:41

Allah, the most Exalted, wants the entire universe to be established on the basis of the good, the ultimate goal it seeks to achieve. He wants humanity to wage a war against corruption right from the very beginning. And He made the struggle among peoples the basis of civilization .{And did not Allah Check one set of people by means of another, the earth would indeed be full of mischief.}

On its part, Islam was very firm in fighting corruption to retrieve the rights of the wronged, and to hinder the mechanisms of the corruption movement, through showing favoritism to those who have corrupted the political and economic life of the people. Imam Ali (a.s.) has indicated that the corrupt of the ruling elite is responsible for the corruption of the public since he maintained that corruption of the public is due to the corruption of the elite.

One of the major tasks embodied in the command to enjoin the good and prohibit evil has always been to confront the corruption in all its forms. Moreover, one of the greatest problems that haunted our Islamic and Arab nation and that aborted the reform of movement was that implicit agreement on not doing anything to confront the corruption that starts from the top to the grassroots level.

Yet even if the intention or will to confront corruption is present, it is not sufficient by itself, because there is also a need for program and for a detailed account of the corruption cases. The reformers should take into account the need to return what has been taken from the state and the public, reactivating the monitoring agencies that hold the corrupt accountable regardless of their political or religious identities, thus providing an opportunity for promoting the culture of reform and laying the foundations for this culture which should include the family, the society and the state.

The problem is that things have become mixed up, and we have become unable to distinguish between the good and the bad, and the reformists have become isolated.

We need a surgical operation to reinvest all our potentials in the plans that could reproduce our nation’s reputation, the reputation that has been distorted by the corrupt who also threatened our future.

We, in Lebanon and the Arab and Islamic worlds, if we are really concerned with confronting corruption, have to start devising the plans of establishing institutions, and trying those who became rich at the expense of the peoples’ hunger. We have to return the money they had stolen, enable the monitoring agencies, and establish the appropriate dynamics and the sound regulations and laws that will trigger development and rebuild the nation.

Nevertheless, such a movement will not be successful as long as the tribal and confessional fever is thriving. Those who claim to be seeking reform should not rush to the foreign or local capital to ask it to invest in Lebanon. They should rather fight tribalism that has plunged the country into the caves of corruption and wants to lead us once again to anarchy and devastation.

The Lebanese authority should reform itself and promote the culture of unity, before it seeks the help of the foreign powers, who are only looking to impose their tutelage and promote their own interests . If there is any foreign power that actually cares for Lebanon it has a lot of questions to ask before it offers any aid. But we are still, whether in the government or in our political parties and movements, very far from producing answers that can only be reached by enhancing the will to change and devising the plans of reform.