No sympathies for the Ombudsman

Editor, I write in reaction to Germaine Ingabire’s letter that appeared in the New Times edition of Wednesday 15/07/09. Germaine advocates for the Old Man Tito to be given “a break” reasoning that slamming him would reduce him to a “barking dog that never bites”. Can anyone out there tell me if the Ombudsman can actually bite? Let’s face it: for the several years that this office has been in place, what has it done to reduce levels of social injustice, corruption, among other evils that are eating up our society? Germaine, its only the Ombudsman’s office that is responsible for its own unserious way of handling matters. They have never bitten. My President was very clear the other day when he called upon Rwandans to desist from being mediocre. Was the Old Man on leave when this message was put across? How can an entire populace be treated to a report based on people’s moods, feelings, interpretations, thoughts etcetera. How can our Parliament even give audience to a man who is going to talk about people’s perceptions of constitutional organs? If all rational decisions were to be taken based on perceptions, then what kind of society would we be living in? Let me for a second, come back to the issue of corruption. My perception is all the institutions named in the report (i.e. traffic police, judiciary, lands office...) are corruptible. Whether this means they are corrupt is another story. Again, this is my perception. The Ombudsman had the option to carry out a proper survey, go to prison records, check out prosecution statistics, visit the suspect institutions and see how corrupt tendencies have been addressed, analyse the Auditor General’s report etc. He opted not to do this, and instead took the short-cut through people’s perceptions. There is a possibility that he could have come up with the same findings after having done a proper job. Mzee Tito, the appointing authority doesn’t like this mediocrity so please get your young and energetic team to do a proper job. Charles Haba Kacyirucharliha@yahoo.com

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No sympathies for the Ombudsman