Mengi: These are the ’sharks of corruption’

IPP Limited Executive Chairman Reginald Mengi yesterday publicly named five alleged ’’corruption sharks’’ in the country, saying they were allegedly responsible for the looting of billions of shillings in public monies.

Mengi said the five prominent individuals - Rostam Aziz, Tanil Somaiya, Yusuf Manji, Jeethu Patel, and Subash Patel - were ’’involved in almost all scandals that have happened in our country.’’

’’The number of people who are accused of being especially corrupt in our country do not exceed ten... But out of the ten, these five are accused of being the sharks of corruption,’’ he told a news conference at IPP headquarters in Dar es Salaam.

He listed corruption scandals allegedly linked to the named individuals as the Richmond and Dowans power generation deals, the Bank of Tanzania’s external payment arrears (EPA) account scam, procurement scandals involving military helicopters and vehicles, the overpriced GulfStream presidential jet purchase, and the Mchuchuma Coal project.

Other scandals associated with some of the named suspects include the $41m military radar deal, national lottery dealings, and dubious deals with the National Social Security Fund (NSSF) and Public Service Pensions Fund (PSPF).

All five named individuals are leading local personalities who have previously been associated with a number of allegations concerning grand corruption.

Mengi told reporters: ’’The great efforts of our president to hasten economic development and better living (conditions) for every Tanzanian are weakened by the horrendous theft of national resources. A great majority of Tanzanians still face extreme poverty; they are unable to determine where the one meal a day is going to come from.’’

He added: ’’To make things worse, where a Tanzanian with better means provides assistance to lessen hardship within the society and to eradicate poverty, these people involved in corruption allege that such assistance has a political agenda. They want Tanzanians to starve or die as a result of other problems.’’

The IPP chairman noted that instead of Tanzanians concentrating on the country’s economic development, they are now spending most of their precious time debating issues of corruption stemming from the ongoing looting of public funds.

’’Our efforts (to combat corruption) have failed to even cause a dent - instead, these corrupt people have been hardened in their determination. They have established newspapers that are abusive and treat Tanzanians with contempt,’’ he said.

’’Even as Tanzanians continue to cry foul, the notoriously corrupt people continue to use their ill-obtained wealth to influence the granting of big government contracts to themselves, often using different names,’’ he further asserted.

’’The notoriously corrupt people have been heard to say that they will annihilate the vehement combatants of corruption. The notoriously corrupt people should know that if the combatants are harmed in any way in this country or any other country, they will be answerable to the people of Tanzania,’’ he continued.

He called on Tanzanians as a whole to collectively ask the question: ’’What gives these notoriously corrupt people the audacity to treat Tanzanians with such contempt?’’

He also called for decisive action against individuals suspected of involvement in grand corruption, saying: ’’All corrupt people - and especially those who are being accused of notorious corruption - must be dealt with conclusively.’’

Failure to take such firm action against high-level graft could ’’rock the stability of our nation’’, he said, adding: ’’We must realize that we have now reached the stage where we must say: Enough is enough.’’