Accountability must be our rock

IMAGINE this: A man who has been bored to death by many eventless weekends in his life decides to give his Sundays a major shake-up by adding a “hobby” to this rather dull day.

Surprisingly, the “hobby” is neither a sport nor does it involve attending Sunday service; on the contrary it is a sick pastime. He rapes and murders innocent women.

When he is finally caught he shows no remorse at all and pleads not guilty to all charges.

Now, imagine another man equally bored on a Sunday. He drowns his soul in drugs and alcohol before racing his car down a busy street for a little bit of fun. In the process, he loses control of his vehicle and mows down a group of innocent children, killing and injuring many of them.

When in court, he also pleads not guilty to all charges, as if he were someone who was not even there when this happened.

These are just two incidents out of thousands of cases that always leave us wondering whether anyone will ever own up to being guilty of anything in South Africa.

Honestly, we hardly hear of anyone pleading guilty of any wrongdoing, especially those in political positions.

If you want to understand the extent of this issue, just ask yourself when the last time was that you heard someone admitting guilt for wrongdoing?

Your answer will probably be “a long time ago’’ or, worse still, “never”.

In these past years many politicians have been accused of such crimes as fraud, corruption, racketeering, defeating the ends of justice and many more: and, as you might have guessed, all of them have pleaded not guilty.

The biggest tragedy in this scenario does not lie in the fact that some people can make crime their hobby and then hire expensive lawyers (often at the taxpayer’s expense) to get them off the hook. Rather, it lies in the fact that only a marginal number of people take responsibility for any wrongdoing.

Our moral fibre is so tattered that killers seem to have no qualms about slaughtering the innocent or plundering from the needy and then raising in court hands dripping blood to protest their innocence.

Gone are the days when you would bank on a wrongdoer’s conscience hammering his/her chest until he/she would admit culpability.

People’s consciences, it would seem, have hardened to the point where they belong in the scrapyard of moral decay.

It is disturbing indeed that only a marginal number of people take responsibility for their actions. And the unfortunate part is that this lack of conscience has effected the youth, the future generation.

At schools we have had to grow accustomed to pupils who never take responsibility for any wrongdoing.

As a teacher, I know only to well that the theme song for all who have done wrong is to shift the blame onto one another.

It might be delusional to say this, but our politicians must take the lead when it comes to taking responsibility for wrongdoing.

We yearn for that day when politicians and ordinary citizens come to the confession room with the words “I got that tender fraudulently”, “I raped a woman”, “I did it, I am sorry”.

That’s the foundation we need to build a better future. Zwelani Ncube comes from Molteno