THE government must be very firm when it comes to issues of corruption.

Service delivery protests are justified, though I do not condone the violence that comes with them.

The SA government is infested with corrupt officials, so poor governance service delivery is widespread.

Improving governance will improve the lives of poor people directly.

It is also essential to creating an environment for faster economic growth.

Both aspects can be compromised by corruption, which our government must address.

In SA, as a developing country, it is the poor who proportionally bear the heaviest cost.

So dealing with corruption is a priority both in terms of who it most affects and which objectives of governance, including participatory and responsive government and economic growth, it constrains.

While there is substance to the belief that fire-engines cannot be designed without a thorough understanding of the fire they are intended to put out, there is also a sense in which the pervasiveness and tenacity of the current fires of corruption are such that action rather than refining theories and processes is what is required.

While theorising might help draw up longer-term approaches to dealing with corruption, there is enough information and experience to develop best practice proposals for more immediate implementation and for developmental strategies linked to the longer-term approaches.

So our government should act swiftly in identifying and uprooting the seed of this calamity if it understands the plight of voting citizens who still live in dire conditions after so many years of democracy.

Sicelo Lata, Vosloorus