THE cabinet's focus on dealing with the potential conflicts of interest of politicians and senior public servants involved in allocating
government contracts and other staterelated business opportunities has been far too long in coming. 

The number of such cases exposed in recent years has been mounting, particularly in some of the less effectively run provinces. There
was the case of the wife of a directly involved cabinet minister having had an interest in a company receiving a slice of a parastatal
management contract. 

Most recently, it can be said with only a little exaggeration that the arms procurement package appears to have been run almost as a
series of family businesses. The related Coega project, too, has raised worrying questions. 

And there appears to have been very little consciousness inside government that there is anything wrong in these instances of conflict of
interest. Yet public opinion polls among the African National Congress's traditional constituency suggest a growing concern about the
incidence of this kind of cronyism. 

Often it has occurred under the pretext of black empowerment, and objections to such arrangements were tagged as racist. Of course,
it is essential that government contracts encompass empowerment features. The question is who should benefit and more importantly
who should not. 

What needs to come to be seen as unacceptable and what Public Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi is going to have to
put in place is a set of rules where individuals, or members of their family or close friends, are precluded from bidding for, or benefiting
commercially from, any project linked to the official. 

The point is that any citizen is entitled to have a shot at bidding for any state contract, but success should depend on the merits of the bid
and not on "who you know". 

The corollary is that any individual who wishes to make his or her livelihood fulfilling state contracts of any sort has to accept that they
would have to have remained independent of the state for a reasonable period. 

The enthusiasm of the new special investigating unit head, Willie Hofmeyr, for taking on corruption is to be welcomed. We will take him
at his word that he will not allow his political connections to sway his judgment. 

Hofmeyr needs to beware, however, that his enthusiasm does not run away with him. His latest suggestion, if he has been properly
understood, is that the burden of proof should be reversed in cases of criminal corruption brought against state officials. This is neither
just nor constitutional. 

It is apparently based on legislation in Hong Kong hardly a model democracy under either British or Chinese rule. The asset forfeiture
laws that Hofmeyr has worked with, where suspects can be deprived of ill-gotten assets through civil actions based on the balance of
probability, are a far cry from criminal law depriving people of their liberty if they cannot prove their innocence. Perhaps asset forfeiture
laws would be sufficient if extended to apply to corrupt public officials. 

In the end, it is not the law that is going to stamp out the kind of unethical behaviour that has become so prevalent. The key is political
will. And that depends on the minister and the lead and standards set by President Thabo Mbeki. 

With acknowledgment to Business Day.