In ostentatious public spending we are like beggars feasting on caviar

It is during crises such as the one that has been brought to us by the Ukraine war that our lethargic consciences get jogged for a while, before we get distracted by another one of those silly little things that occupy our daily conversations.

The war on Ukraine has surely hit our pockets hard and all around us are taking note of real life issues, like how do we survive the rocketing costs of living?

From fuel to food prices, and more, it seems there is an upward spiral in what we have to cough up just to stay afloat, without even moving forward an inch.

We are going to have to be more careful about how we spend our little money, and maybe this is what we should have been doing all along, only we are incurable spendthrifts. It might look like the less we have, the more we want to spend.

Brain teaser

I remember a former president saying something quite remarkable, and no one in the audience seemed to notice the presidential brain teaser. He said something to the effect that people were making too much noise about the amount of money government was spending but not suggesting how state coffers could be beefed up, which would allow the government to spend more without people paying too much attention to the spending!

It is this type of idiocy that gets drilled into our skulls to the extent that we lose real life perspectives and live in the wonderlands we have created for ourselves.

No wonder some people believed the late president John Magufuli when he said that Tanzania would soon be a donor country!

That may come one day, but look at the way we go about basic things. Anyone who has ever run a small private business will tell you that motor vehicle pools are the most notorious when it comes to draining resources, and so they are usually got rid of or reduced to the bare minimum.

The practice around the world is to make employees, including at the highest levels of government, access easy loans and buy their own cars, which they then drive as they wish, only drawing allowances for fuel and maintenance.

Own car

This has shown us that no official, however extravagant, will load his own car with charcoal, firewood or scrap metal, which they routinely do with government cars.

I said what governments have done to alleviate the problem. I should add here that the Tanzanian government did this too, back in the 1980s but, after the officers had been loaned former government cars, the government then bought new cars for the government pool, and it was — and still is — business as usual!

It is this nonchalance on issues regarding public property that is making our government perhaps among the most expensive to run in the world, per capita.

The government vehicle pool boasts arguably the flashiest models, flashier than what you see in Saudi Arabia.

Compared to us, our neighbours in the East African Community are lagging behind in driving bespoke wheels, although South Sudan may soon catch up in bad behaviour.

It is the ostentation of poor folks, like beggars feasting on caviar!

Unacceptable situation

Now, this does need a Ukraine to make people notice there is an unacceptable situation.

The other day I heard the Speaker of Parliament telling MPs that they should switch off their vehicles when they (the members) are in session.

In other words, while the legislators are in parliament their vehicles are running outside the august House, waiting for the “waheshimiwa” to find their cars properly cooled. It is almost pornographic.

A representative body that shows no concern for the squandering of the resources of their people is symptomatic of a deep-seated rot in the entrails of the system it serves.

No one needs telling that our people are dirt poor, and that their poverty is being exacerbated by those individuals they “elected” (doubtful) so they can “bring them development” (impossible).

I pity the Speaker for having had to make the admission in public about the running engines of MPs’ cars. It is so embarrassing that many people with a sense of pride would have said it in camera — in an office circular, perhaps — so as not to anger the populace.

But maybe she thought it was okay to say it in public since many people knew about it anyway, and in a country where abominations occur on a daily basis, this is likely to come across as trivia.

But there is something bordering on a mental illness when grown-ups cannot realise that their economic realities do not warrant them to live and behave like they were Beyoncé Knowles or Aliko Dangote.

Our rulers need serious counselling to liberate them from this illness that has gripped all our public service structures.

We simply do not make sense, and I think that those observing us — especially those we are continually begging for alms — must be wandering whether we possess normal working brains.

Jenerali Ulimwengu is now on YouTube via jeneralionline tv. E-mail: [email protected]