14 December
By Sann Ni Lar Win
IN the civilization of mankind, spiritual culture and physical culture play an important role. I compete with internationals, to be regarded as civilized and good-natured people, we have to obey the teachings of our parents, our first foremost mentors, since the day we were born.
As Myanmar is generally Buddhists, they obey lord Buddha’s preaching. Buddha’s preaching is propagated by Sanghas. They lead to physical and mental well-being by Sasana.
The famous Greek philosopher Aristotle said that when wealth is lost, nothing is lost when health is lost. Something is lost; when character is lost, everything is lost.
I remember that since attending primary school which is situated in a monastery compound, we learned lessons concerning stealing someone’s own. In this lesson, a young son always steals someone’s property and money, and then he conferred with his mother. But she used to accept them greedily. One day, her son was arrested on account of a theft case as a thief, and he was sentenced to imprisonment by the judge. Suddenly he called his mother and bit her ear because she didn’t admonish him.
Today the world has never experienced such phenomenal material progress as it is realizing in the age. However, despite this wonderful progress, it is not unfortunate that mankind tends to neglect spiritual well-being.
Mankind appears to have been blinded by material achievements thinking that materialism is the end all of everything. Mankind has forgotten that materialism alone does not provide the true happiness or spiritual well-being sought after by mankind.
In our human society, corruption and bribery are a kind of stealing. Corruption impairs investment with consequent effects on growth and jobs. Countries capable of confronting corruption use their human and financial resources more efficiently alter more investment and grow more rapidly.
According to a survey study, the following factors have been attributed as causes of corruption.
Greed of money, desire
Higher levels of market and political monopolization
Low levels of democracy week civil participation and low political transparency
Corruption is a crime, let’s destroy it before it destroys us. Anti-Bribery and Anti. Corruption calls that collectively prohibit bribery and corruption.
Corruption also erodes the trust we have in the public sector to act in our best interests. It wastes taxes and rates meant for important community projects. This results in poor quality services or infrastructure, or projects never getting off the ground.
International Anti-Corruption Day is observed on 9 December each year. This data was chosen because if marks the anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations Convention against Corruption in 2003, a significant milestone in the global fight against corruption.
United against Corruption. Build a Brighter Future, Break the Chain, End the stain, and choose integrity. No bribas, No Lios, Just a fairer Rise. Corruption Dosen’t Balong, let. Make it gone.
A person who does bad things will get bad results. A person who does good action will likewise get good results.
Bribery and corruption can be compared to the fear of poisonous snakes. There is a discourse in “Anguttara Nikaya” (အင်္ဂုတ္တရ နိကာယ်) in which Lord Buddha talks about the virtues that are conducive to material benefits in the present. When practised constantly, these virtues, which are four in number, enable one to succeed in life bringing in happiness and prosperity. They are called as follows:
- Utthana Sampada = Being endowed with energy (ဥဌာနသမ္ပဒါ)
- Arakkha Sampada = Being endowed with vigilance for protection (အာရက္ခ သမ္ပဒါ)
- Kalyanamittata =Association with good people (ကလျာဏမိတ္တတာ)
- Samajivita =Leading a balanced life (သမဇီဝိတာ)
The first virtue, Utthana Sampada, is the most important thing to begin with. Uttbana literally means to go up or to rise. To succeed in life man must be filled with enthusiasm and energy, he must be fired with ambition and a strong desire to succeed. He must strive to be the best.
Wealth and fortune come to those who work best. But are cannot get rich if one does not know how to protect or take care of what has already been acquired. We must therefore practice the second virtue.
The second virtue, Arakkha Sampada, advises us to be vigilant, not careless, about what we have earned or possessed. We must know, for example, how to use our money properly so it will give us maximum benefit. Strange though it may seem, many people don’t know how to use their money. They waste it on cigarettes, drinks, and drugs, which only enslave them and drag them toward a premature death impoverishing them in the process. Many people lose their fortune in gambling, shamelessly running their families, and many are forced into crime or illicit occupations, and end up in prison.
The third virtue, Kalayanamittata, is no less important for achieving the desired success. Man can not live all alone by himself, he needs friends, associates, and colleagues (in addition to relatives, of course). These people play a significant role in his life. They can influence his thoughts, change his views and character, and even promote or ruin his life. If you are very close, for instance, to a friend who is foulmouthed, arrogant and has no respect for his parents, and if you keep company with him long enough, you will gradually imitate his evil character.
A balanced life in Samajivita mena is wisely conducted neither too economically nor extravagate a Dharmic life, which is noble, useful and contented. A Samajivita person lives according to his means; he is not carried away by the “high fashion” of the day. His life is exemplary free from pretensions and harm. It is a life of service rather than selfishness living in this way ensures not only that whatever has been acquired is well protected, but also that whatever is spent is wisely and usefully spent.
Especially, if the government in a country can fix corruption and bribery, we have to get a clean government and good governance. The types of consciousness, and thoughts, that are accompanied by these bad roots of greed, hatred (ill-will) and ignorance or called bad. Any deed is done or word uttered with bad thoughts, purging them of three bad roots greed, hatred and ignorance.
In conclusion, character is the best power for every person with innocence. I believe that all stakeholders such as government, citizens and the private sector need to work together to eradicate corruption and bribery. I realize that every citizen should be vigilant and commit to higher standards of support to fight against corruption and bribery. References:
- သူတို့နှင့် ကျွန်တာ်ကျွန်တာ် နှင့်သူတို့ (စန်းနီလာဝင်း၊ ဂုဏ်ထူးစာပေ 2006 ခုနှစ် ဒီဇင်ဘာလ)
- Basic Buddhism Course by Phra Sunthon Plamintr, PhD, Buddhadharma Meditation Centre USA, 1991, June)
