The findings of the Selayang survey that the police was ranked most corrupt of all government agencies was something hardly surprising to all motorists and motorcyclists who have to ' selesai ' (settle) a traffic offence instantly with a RM50 tip.

Sometimes, when one has only RM100 notes, one can even ask and be given the RM50 change by the traffic cop!

Considering the low remuneration of cops, I would call this a 'tip' in the greater cause of wealth redistribution from the 'haves' to the 'have-nots'.

This practice is endemic because corruption is a way of life that makes things possible. Besides giving additional income to the so-called black sheep among the cops, bureaucrats or civil servants (for re-distribution of wealth) they enable:

  • Offenders of minor traffic laws to save themselves from having to pay heavier fines or going to the police station;

  • Illegal immigrants to continue on overstaying;

  • Unlicensed hawkers and vendors of pirated VCDs, operators of brothels and all kinds of fringe or illegal but lucrative businesses, an opportunity to continue on plying their trade.

    • Why should lowly paid functionaries and rank and file be vilified as being corrupt when they are only following 'leadership by example', the example already set at the highest levels by the elites of a society structured on patronage of various kinds — feudal, political, corporate, etc?

    If according to the survey respondents who owned businesses and those in the higher-income group were most likely to be approached for bribes, it must not be forgotten that it always takes two to tango. It is just as likely that those who own businesses and have high income are the ones who seek 'to take care' of the right people to get their business licences in the first place.

    Again I am not referring to just public officials or government servants. We are talking of politicians, corporate figures, bankers and others — in short, just about anyone who can dispense a business favour or impose a restriction.

    These kinds of payments to both functionaries and rank and file as well as top rungs of political, corporate, business and bureaucratic hierarchies are treated as an inevitable business costs, necessary to secure the big contracts — and become ugly only because they are passed down ultimately to the innocent consumers.

    Not all persons share the view that this big 'merry-go-round' of 'bribe and be bribed' is our national scourge.

    I have friends who reversed migrate from Australia and New Zealand without regrets (except possibly that they did not do so earlier) because they 'perversely' found quality of life 'better' here by the simple reason that everything is possible for a price in Malaysia Boleh -land but not over there.

    Here, they could not only bribe themselves out of a drink-driving offence after a night of boozing, their children too can buy all kinds of 'pirated' softwares for educational purposes, and they themselves could start up businesses and thrive in prosperity that they could not do elsewhere.

    Those who morally admonish corruption and patronage that supposedly erode the moral fibre of our society may be doing so because they happen to be within the group that bears the costs without the compensations of the spoils thereof.

    It is agreed that in a corruption-free society there are weightier compensations like for example a more efficient civil service and impartial law enforcement for public good and a more efficient allocation of economic resources.

    This is something we have never had and so we cannot miss what we have not experienced.

    Instead we may miss any 'virtue' in this vice of corruption when we are out of the country and duly inconvenienced in other 'clean' countries when we cannot bribe ourselves out of a tight spot or solve an intractable problem by giving a 'tip' we can easily afford.