George Ng’ambi’s Closet

Welcome to the world of reason, balance and truth.

England must respect Croatia and move on.

This week like many others, I have been watching the Euro 2008. Although it has failed to provide the thrill of Euro 2000, atleast we have been served with some entertainment value from notable teams such Holland, Spain and to a less extent Portugal.

Conspicously missing from the tournament is England national team who were knocked out from the qualifiers by Croatia. However, at the ongoing tournament Croatia struggled to beat Austria in their first game but luckily won 1-0 thanks to a 4th minute penalty converted by spurs bound Lucas Modric. In their usual style to influence popular opinion, the English tabloids picked on Croatia and their coach(Bilic), questioning how a team that was struggling to beat Austria were able to beat England. In essence the Journalists were saying that croatia are not good enough to be at the tournament over England. Today, Croatia responded to all doubting English people by beating German 2-1 to go top of their group, underlining the fact that the results they got against England(home and away) was not fluke.

I must say that am fed up of this attitude by English press. England national team is full of players with egos, and it is the press who overrate these seemingly useless players who earn tonnes of £££s a week for doing nothing. All they do is spend alot of time on Playstation and Xbox while other players such Ronaldo, Fabregas constantly work on their fitness to perfect their game. Then when the national team fails, they are quick to blame foreigners for their mess.

Sepp Blatter and the 6+5 rule

The FIFA president has since proposed that teams must feature 6 homegrown against 5 foreign players. The English FA has since welcomed the idea subject to further exploration. It is hoped that by adopting this rule, clubs may be able to nurture homegrown talent other than relying on talent from abroad. But why am I sceptical about this idea?? Firstly, it would restrict freedom of players and indeed clubs to play/purchase from wherever they want. Secondly, most clubs are owned by billionares who are not nationals of the country in which their football clubs are domiciled. Their interest may be at odds with say the FA. While FA may be interested in ensuring as many English players in a team as possible, club owners may be looking to purchase world class players who may add business value to the club.Thirdly, when Sepp Blatter embarks on journey such as this, he is up to something. I remember he duped the Football Association of Malawi by promising to fund the construction of Chiwembe stadium through GOAL project, but as it turned out all he wanted was a vote from FAM and as soon as he got it, Blatter disappeared. Today, Chiwembe stadium is nothing but a dream. He has since offered England to host the 2018 World Cup and he has now interested English people by proposing the 6+5 rule. Would this fella be enticing the FA for a vote? Would this be an attempt to silence the English media in their quest to investigate his involvement in corrupt practices at FIFA?

Anyway, all am saying is that England must learn to respect other nations. Croatia deserve to be at the Euro 2008 as they emerged top of the Group and beat England twice. The problem of falling Football standards has nothing to do with the influx of foreign players. What foreigners have done is to improve the premier league other than destroy it. England can not improve if they persistently blame others for the misdeed of their own creation.

State of the Economy

On the economic front, a special report has in part blamed migrants for the state of the British economy. It is alleged that migrants send alot of money abroad which does not help their economy. Koma abale!!!

I will not discuss this indepth but my understanding is that the credit crunch has been caused by a global phenomena, especially the USA housing market. The rising costs of crude oil has affected all countries and not Britain in isolation. The British economy is propelled by migrants who themselves earn less for hard labour while native British citizens sit phwii getting government social benefits. Migrants have been coming and settling in the UK since time in memorial, these were not attributed to as factors when the UK enjoyed economic success.

So as you can see, English people will blame foreigners for anything that goes against them.

12 June, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

Xenophobic South Africa is a shame.

A violent  south africaWhen South Africans fought against the whitemans’ injustices during the apartheid era, everyone understood as the white man had imposed alot of unfair laws against our black brothers back then. The release of Nelson Mandela in the early 90s announced the new dawn of life for the people not only in South Africa but the southern Africa as a whole. It announced the morning star rising, announcing time for an end to violence and killings that had characterised a South Africa pre-1990.

However, the events of the past few weeks involving native south africans killing and beating fellow africans from sorrounding countries who migrated to that country for a better living have taken us back to the apartheid days. It is sad that South Africans feel that violence against people from other countries is the solution to their social and political problems. These demeaning actions are orchestrated by lazy xenophobic elements who wrongly portray foriegners as the cause of thier economic problems in South Africa. Countries in the west are luring immigrants who inturn boost their economies. Its a shame that majority of South Africans are peace loving people but scenes of xenophobic violence threaten to cast doubt over how well prepared the south african government is, interms of security during the 2010 FIFA world cup, the World cup which will attract the same foriegners whom the native south africans are now despising. South Africans travel and continue to do so to so many countries around the world. Would they be happy to be treated the way they are treating migrants in Johannesburg. Sadly, the officials in South Africa have not acted strongly to this madness by their people. The deployment of the army to assist police in crowd control has had to take international pressure.

I bet Thabo Mbeki in his usual drama will say, this is not a disgrace.The allegations that the government knew in January 2008 that there was trouble of xenophobic nature blewing will cast doubt over Thabo Mbeki’s leadership. Why did the government let the situation get out of hand notwithstanding the intel they they received? I call upon all south africans to respect the rule of law and human rights and stop venting their frustration for unfulfilled ANC government promises on innocent foreigners. I worry for my sister and other Malawians in Johannesburg who must be feeling worried everytime they walk along the streeets to and from work. South Africans must remember that the struggle against apartheid could not have been won without the support from neighbouring and other african countries who are now being condemned to death by barbaric people.

23 May, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

Are Harare and Nairobi setting the African Political pattern?

I hate to think that I may be a prophet of doom. But the elections in Kenya that were marred by seens of violence and intimidation compounded by Mugabe’s Zanu PF reluctance to release results and order an unwarranted recount in 23 parliamentary seats gives me a dozen of reasons to worry. More so because Malawians will be going to polls in or around May 2009. I hate to imagine that my vote will be rendered useless by the corrupt electoral system as is the case in Zimbabwe. The dilemma faced in that country is that the person who won before the recount is not known. We will never know, will we?

History has shown that politics follow a certain pattern/trend in Africa. I do not want to give merit to bad politics that we have witnessed, so I will not highlight examples. However, it is my prayer that all Malawians of goodwill shall condemn any attempt by our political leaders to disintegrate a united country such as our own in order to remain in power or gain positions of influence. A violent country such as Kenya and Zimbabwe retards the development of the Tourism Industry and slows foreign investment.

22 April, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

After so many Arrests, Intimidation, Torture, the worst economy…..and still no elections results, Thabo Mbeki says,"There is no crisis in Zimbabwe"

As a Malawian I am hurt by sweeping statements such as the declaration by Thabo Mbeki that there is “No crisis in Zimbabwe.” It hurts because the economic turmoil in Zimbabwe impacts negatively on Malawi but most importantly, Zimbabweans are like a family member. Our Malawian brothers and sisters settled in Zimbabwe for economic reasons and now consider themselves as Zimbabweans. We have also been at the mercy of some unspeakable dictatorial tendencies under Dr.Kamuzu Banda and no sane person would wish another country to go through the same hurt as we did.

Zimbabwe has gone through the worst economic period in history. The facts are there for everyone to see yet Thabo Mbeki deliberately chooses to wear blindfolds for the sake of personal relationship with Mugabe. As far as Mbeki is concerned nothing exists in his infinite wisdom. First, he denied that HIV/Aids existed, today, South Africa remains one of the highly ravaged nations with the epidemic. His persistent denials refused him the opportunity to institute HIV/Aids preventative programmes. Many children are now opharned and live in care. Second, he denied that crime rate is high in South Africa but the truth is that RSA is the worst country on armed robberies and gun crimes in the southern Africa. Today, he does not seem to appreciate that the situation in Zimbabwe is worth of a crisis.

It does not suprise me that the ANC chose Zuma to stand as a presidential candidate. Not that am a fan of his but I guess he is good for a change than the clown in Mbeki. How many Zimbabweans can the South African government accommodate who are now flooding the country everyday for a better life. Until Mbeki and Mugabe realise that the era of the liberation struggle is long-gone, there shall be unprecedented damage like none we have seen before.

13 April, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

After so many Arrests, Intimidation, Torture, the worst economy…..and still no elections results, Thabo Mbeki says,"There is no crisis in Zimbabwe"

As a Malawian I am hurt by sweeping statements such as the declaration by Thabo Mbeki that there is “No crisis in Zimbabwe.” It hurts because the economic turmoil in Zimbabwe impacts negatively on Malawi but most importantly, Zimbabweans are like a family member. Our Malawian brothers and sisters settled in Zimbabwe for economic reasons and now consider themselves as Zimbabweans. We have also been at the mercy of some unspeakable dictatorial tendencies under Dr.Kamuzu Banda and no sane person would wish another country to go through the same hurt as we did.

Zimbabwe has gone through the worst economic period in history. The facts are there for everyone to see yet Thabo Mbeki deliberately chooses to wear blindfolds for the sake of personal relationship with Mugabe. As far as Mbeki is concerned nothing exists in his infinite wisdom. First, he denied that HIV/Aids existed, today, South Africa remains one of the highly ravaged nations with the epidemic. His persistent denials refused him the opportunity to institute HIV/Aids preventative programmes. Many children are now opharned and live in care. Second, he denied that crime rate is high in South Africa but the truth is that RSA is the worst country on armed robberies and gun crimes in the southern Africa. Today, he does not seem to appreciate that the situation in Zimbabwe is worth of a crisis.

It does not suprise me that the ANC chose Zuma to stand as a presidential candidate. Not that am a fan of his but I guess he is good for a change than the clown in Mbeki. How many Zimbabweans can the South African government accommodate who are now flooding the country everyday for a better life. Until Mbeki and Mugabe realise that the era of the liberation struggle is long-gone, there shall be unprecedented damage like none we have seen before.

13 April, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

The FieldYork Education Scandal-Justice delivered or denied?

I commend the Judge and the councel for the prosecution in a case involving the former Education minister of Education Sam Mpasu. The judge for a well reasoned judgement and the prosecution councel for presenting a plausible and persuassive case leading to the conviction last week of the said person. However, I have problems with the delay with which such a high profile and important case has been handled. The offences were committed in 1994 when the convict was serving as a Minister of Education in theUDF-government. In the first count the court concluded that the prisoner abused his office by concluding an arrangement with Fieldyork international without authority and in disregard of procurement procedures. On the second count it was established that the prisoner arbitrarily directed his Principal Secretary to sign and send a fax to the sameFieldyork. On the third count the court concluded that Mr. Mpasu directed Mr. Safuli (former secretary for education) to send a letter of intent to Fieldyork. Mr Mpasu benefitted from the fieldyork transactions in 14 years ago and facts to that effect immediately became public knowledge.

His suspension was seen as superficial as Mpasu continued to enjoy executive previleges under Bakili Muluzi yet the free primary school suffered as the scheme lacked materials. The ministry was subsequently rocked by numerous corruption scandals including the K187m involvingCassim Chilumpha and Jeff wa Jeffrey. The catalogue of scandals that ensued occured because Mpasu was not punished at the time. Did the prosecution fail to carry out their job? Was Mpasu protected by the UDF government or indeed Mr Muluzi who is alleged to have been complicit to the case? Did Mpasu act alone or as the judge concluded he merely is a sacrificial lamb?

Contrast the handling of Mpasu case with that of Matilda Katopola(the clerk of parliament) who also fraughted procurement procedures by awarding contracts to her own firm(Monik’s Enterprise).Public servants must always put the interest of the public first before their own. Selfishness is a serious disease in Malawi which has made many Malawians in villages suffer because one individual wants everything for themselves. FridayJumbe built sunrise hotel from the alleged proceeds from sale of Maize when he worked as Excutive Director of Admarc. Malawians starved yet as I write, Jumbe is a free man.

One thing for sure is that the conviction of Mpasu will act as a deterent to those that might want to be involved in corrupt practices. Thats comforting for me,but as they say, Justice delayed is justice denied.

11 April, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

Northern Rock Bank and Directors Remuneration

Some things dont just make sense. Northern Rock, a Nationalised financial institution in the United Kingdom has just confirmed that it paid its former Chief Executive Adam Applegarth who resigned amidst claims of taking high risk ventures, a sum of nearly £800,000 as golden handshake, £360,000 as pension top-up and he continues to enjoy cut-price staff mortgage. The Bank also paid its former CEO £5,000 towards personal legal fees and around £7,500 for his personal security at home.

Northern Rock sought government assistance from the Bank of England in September 2007. The Bank made a pre-tax loss of £167.7m in 2007 against profits of £626.7m in 2006(www.ft.com). This followed it writing-off £239.7m in bad debts and another £232.2m from investments linked to the US sub-prime property market which affected the Bank massively for not spreading its investments across many business lines.

Against the background of this mismanagement, it is sad to note that the taxpayers money has gone towards redeeming the troubled bank as well as paying its former directors as a tocken of appreciation for simply mismanaging the bank.

Meanwhile, job-cuts are looming, the bank has also intensified repossessions of properties under mortgage on its books, the exact time during which the bank is to repay the loan of about £25bn owed to tax-payers is very uncertain, the general economy has suffered leading into other banking institutions also asking the government for protection. Tax payers will have to incur alot of costs to lawyers, accountants, consultants and PR companies.

My concern is that terms of employment contract that allow directors to a huge payout following business failure is wrong as is absurd. It is the shareholders who suffer massive losses as these Executives are guaranteed their income for steering companies in hard waters. Its seems just 7 years after the collapse of Enron, most corporate governance regimes including the the self-regulatory UK’s Combine Code has alot of work to be done. The Sarbenes Oxley Act 2002, in the USA does place emphasis on CEO and CFOs responsibility to ensure that their risk management procedures are adequate otherwise they are punished by not paying out their bonuses.

If I were a shareholder of Northern Rock, I would be asking serious questions to the CEO and Finance Director to explain how a pre-tax profit of £626.7m in 2006 became a loss of £167.6m in 2007. Sadly, the former CEO has his career intact and his income unaffected and yet the shareholders have lost everything following the Nationalisation.

1 April, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

Four Types of Government Operatives: Bullies, Muggers, Sneak Thieves, and Con Men

December 20, 2007
Robert Higgs

Somehow it seemed as though the farm had grown richer without making the animals themselves any richer—except, of course, for the pigs and the dogs.
—George Orwell, Animal Farm

The beginning of political wisdom is the realization that despite everything you’ve always been taught, the government is not really on your side; indeed, it is out to get you.

Sometimes government functionaries and their private-sector supporters want simply to bully you, to dictate what you must do and what you must not do, regardless of whether anybody benefits from your compliance with these senseless, malicious directives. The drug laws are the best current example, among many others, of the government as bully. Our rulers presently enforce a host of laws that combine the worst aspects of puritanical priggishness and the invasive, pseudo-scientific, therapeutic state. They tolerate our pursuit of happiness only so long as we pursue it exclusively in officially approved ways: gin, yes; weed, no.

Notwithstanding the great delight that our rulers take in tormenting us with their absurdly inconsistent nanny-state commands, they generally have bigger fish to fry. Above all, the government and its special-interest backers want to take our money. If these people ran a store, they might aptly call it Robberies R Us. Their credo is simple and brazen: “you have money, and we want it.”

Unlike the sincere street criminal, however, the robber in official guise rarely puts his proposition to you in the blunt form of “your money or your life,” however much he intends to relate to you on precisely such terms. (If you doubt my characterization of these intentions, test what happens if you steadfastly resist at every step as the brigands escalate their threats: first ordering you to pay, then billing you for unpaid balances plus penalties and interest, sending you a summons, and ultimately beating you into submission or killing you for resisting arrest. Your sustained, open resistance always ends in the state’s use of violence against you, in either your forcible imprisonment or your removal from the land of the living, after which your memory will be defamed by your designation as a criminal—governments never settle for mere brutality, but always supplement it with unabashed presumptuousness.)

When I say “rarely,” I do not mean that the authorities never carry out their plunder blatantly. Throughout the land, for example, criminal courts, acting as de facto muggers, strip people of great sums of money in the aggregate by fining them for conduct that ought never to have been criminalized in the first place—drug-law violations, prostitution, gambling, antitrust-law violations, traffic infractions, reporting violations, doing business without a license, and innumerable other victimless “crimes.” The predatory judges and their police henchmen care no more about justice than I care to live on a diet of pig pancreas and boiled dandelions. They are simply taking people’s money because it’s there to be taken with minimal effort. In this manifestation, government amounts to a gigantic speed trap.

The more common way for government officials to rob you, however, involves their seizure of so-called taxes, which take countless forms, all of which are purported to be collected in order to finance—mirabile dictu—benefits for you. Such a deal! You’d have to be a real ingrate to complain about the government’s snatching your money for the express purpose of making your world a better place.

Sometimes the “political exchange” into which you are hauled kicking and screaming rests on such a ludicrous foundation, however, that honesty compels us to classify it, too, as a mugging. I have in mind such compassionately conservative policies as stripping taxpayers of hundreds of billions of dollars and handing the money over, for the most part, to rich people engaged in large-scale agribusiness and, sometimes, to landowners who don’t even bother to represent themselves as farmers. The apologies that the agribusiness whores in Congress make for this daylight robbery are so patently stupid and immoral that the whole shameless affair resembles nothing so much as the schoolyard bully’s grabbing the little kids’ lunch money and then taunting them aggressively, “If you don’t like it, why don’t you do something about it?” Every five years, when the farm-subsidy law expires and a new one is enacted, a few members of Congress pose as reformers of this piracy, but truly serious reforms never occur, and even the minor ones that come along from time to time prove unavailing, as the farm-booty interests invariably suck up “emergency relief” payments from the public treasury later on to make up for any shortfalls from the main subsidy programs.

Government sneak thieves, in contrast, fear that they may occupy more vulnerable positions than the agribusiness gang and similarly impudent special-interest groups cum legislators, so they dare not taunt the little kids so flagrantly. Instead, they specialize in legislative riders, budgetary add-ons and earmarks, logrolling, omnibus “Christmas tree” bills, and other gimmicks designed to conceal the size, the beneficiaries, and sometimes even the existence of their theft. At the end of the day, the taxpayers find there’s nothing left in the till, but they have little or no idea where all of their money went. Finding out by reading an appropriations act is next to impossible, inasmuch as these statutes are almost incomprehensible to everyone but the legislative insiders and their staff members who devise them and write them down in a combination of Greek, Latin, and Sanskrit.

For example, for many years, a single congressman from northeastern Pennsylvania—first Dan Flood and then Joe McDade—substantially enriched the anthracite coal interests of that region by inserting a brief, one-paragraph limitation rider in the annual appropriations act for the Department of Defense. The upshot of this obscure provision was that Pennsylvania anthracite was transported to Germany to provide heating fuel for U.S. military bases that could have been heated more cheaply by using local resources. This coals-to-Newcastle shenanigan was a classic sneak-thief gambit, a thing of legislative beauty, but every year’s budget contains thousands of schemes that operate with similar effect, if not in an equally audacious manner.

Unlike the government sneak thieves, the government con men openly advertise—indeed, expect to receive great credit for—certain uses of the taxpayers’ money that are represented as bringing great benefits to the general public or a substantial segment of it. Surely the best example of the con man’s art is so-called national defense, a bottomless pit into which the government now dumps, in various forms (many of them not officially classified as “defense”), approximately a trillion dollars of the taxpayers’ money each year. The government stoutly maintains, of course, that all ordinary Americans are constantly in grave danger of attack by foreigners—nowadays, by Islamic terrorists, in particular—and that these voracious wolves can be kept from the door only by the maintenance and active deployment of large armed forces equipped with ultra-sophisticated (and correspondingly expensive) equipment and stationed at bases in more than a hundred countries and on ships at sea around the globe.

Without dismissing the alleged dangers entirely, a sensible person quickly appreciates that the threat is slight—just do the math, using reasonable probability coefficients—whereas the cost of (purportedly) dealing with it is colossal. In short, as General Smedley Butler informed us more than seventy years ago, the modern military establishment, along with most of its blessed wars, is for the most part nothing but a racket. Worse, because of the way it engages and co-opts powerful elements of the private sector, it gives rise to a costly and dangerous form of military-economic fascism. Lately, the classic military-industrial-congressional complex has been supplemented by an even more menacing (to our liberties) security-industrial-congressional complex, whose aim is to enrich its participants by equipping the government for more effectively spying on us and invading our privacy in ways great and small.

Worst of all, despite everything that is claimed for the military’s protective powers, its operation and deployment overseas leave us ordinary Americans facing greater, not lesser, risk than we would otherwise face, because of the many enemies it cultivates who would have left us alone, if the U.S. military had only left them alone. (Yes, Virginia, they are over here because we’re over there.) The president routinely declares that the hugely increased expenditures and overseas deployments for military purposes since 2001 have reduced the threat of terrorism, but, in fact, terrorist incidents and deaths have increased, not decreased. Although privileged elements of the political class gain from militarism and neo-imperialist wars, the rest of us invariably lose economic well-being, real security, and all too often life itself. In 2004, people who said that security against terrorism was their top concern voted disproportionately, by an almost 7-to-1 margin, for George W. Bush. They had been conned.

Although the mugger, the sneak thief, and the con man are not the only types of government operatives, they make up a large proportion of the leading figures in government today. The lower ranks, especially in the various police agencies, have a disproportionate share of the bullies. No attempt to understand government can succeed without a clear understanding of these ideal types and each one’s characteristic modus operandi. With this understanding firmly in mind, you will remain permanently immune to the infectious swindle, “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.” The truth, of course, is the exact opposite: I say again, the government—this vile assemblage of bullies, muggers, sneak thieves, and con men—is not really on your side; indeed, it is out to get you.

6 January, 2008 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | 2 Comments

4 Steps just above a Quarter of a century-Gone too young!!

On 27th October,2007
A dark cloud descended upon us
Villie, you breathed your last
In the caring hands of MUM, you slept
Never to wake up again.

A tower of security was taken from us
You were in the Army 5 years and 5 days
How Ironic?
You left your colleagues and family just 2 months
after your 29th Birthday
On a satarday afternoon of a hot summer day.

Away from home, I would call and ask;
Zikuyenda amwene? and
1-2, 1-2 you would answer
A catch phrase you will be remembered by.

Villie, You had unreserved love for children,
Yet you left your daughter Tumbikani,
So young at 10 months
The thought, she will grow up not enjoying
the same love you gave to others is difficult to comprehend

I can not seem to get answers why you had to go.
Today, I call your number hoping I would hear the reassuring voice
It seems you are outside the access area.

The only voice I remember is your own prothetic phrase
“Ndikubwera amwene” answering to my question “how are you feeling?”
How weird!
You also prophesied to mum how you wished you could be dressed
in a suit as you were about to embark on a long journey to Dwangwa
A journey that was to take you to your final resting place.

Your loss from this life has been a hard blow on family members
I have no one to talk to about our brotherly but humble past. No one!!
The only thing that comforts me is the realisation
That you have a peaceful life.
Although you are not here in fresh,
Your spirit lives.

Your death has enlightened many of the good things you did
Very kind, warm, compassionate, generous, friendly, and approachable
Yet you never blew the trumpet of your own work.

Till we meet again Villie,
May the Good Lord grant you Eternal peace

Your Brother

George Mzomera

10 November, 2007 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet

Figures Don’t Lie, But Liars Figure-Arguments for a Principles based approach in Accounting

It’s a debate that’s of more than academic interest.

Despite what the term suggests, U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles(GAAP) are really not about principle, nor about doing what is right. So says U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who in a back-to-basics speech at Georgetown University said U.S. accountants should return to putting the emphasis on “principles” in GAAP.

“In my judgment, we must rise above a rules-based mindset that asks, ‘Is this legal?’ and adopt a more principles-based approach that asks, ‘Is this right?’” in order to get truly effective corporate governance that makes for a sounder stock market that earns investor confidence, Paulson said.

Paulson gave voice to a mounting clamor from guardians of financial veracity that is calling on regulators to toss out the rules-based approach in favor of a simple set of guiding principles in accounting.

The angst is that a rules-oriented accounting world, where executives and their auditors dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s, has become more about meeting the letter of the law and not the spirit of the law, about fretting to make financial reporting cookie-cutter right and not simply about doing what is right at the outset.

It’s a push to make an honest, simple confession–that if accounting really is an art and not a science, then it really does have subjectivity in it and so must be principles-based rather than rules-based.

The thinking also is, a rules-based accounting world has spawned a host of problems:

–More detailed accounting rules require a paper load equivalent to the Black Forest to publish and have created whoppers like the longest U.S. standard on accounting for financial derivatives, which runs to almost 1,000 pages and which you can’t pay three experts to agree on.

–A rules-based world has created a leviathan of a legal and accounting profession populated by modern-day Gnostics who feverishly interpret and re-interpret the rules in search of loopholes in exchange for fat fees.

–Though the accountants tried to envisage a rule for every situation, the rules-reliant standards that are U.S. GAAP have failed to protect investors from corporate failures like Enron.

It’s a debate that’s picked up speed in Congress. The House of Representatives recently unanimously passed legislation requiring regulators to testify each year on their efforts to develop principles-based accounting standards. The Securities & Exchange Commission is getting closer to letting foreign firms report their financial results in the U.S. using the supposedly more principles-based international accounting standards–with the thinking that, one day, U.S. companies would do the same.

The balance between rules- and principles-based standards has been debated since the abacus was invented. There is no doubt that the corporate scandals of five years ago showed that executives took advantage of the weaknesses in rules-based regimes.

But are those in the debate stretching that very point until it snaps? Would a principles-based regime really have stopped Tyco International’s (nyse: TYC news people ) Dennis Kozlowski? Isn’t it a bit unhinged, if not untethered from reality, not to acknowledge that all standards are subject to interpretation?

Even now, don’t many bean counters worldwide pine for a return to principles-based accounting in even the international accounting standards, which ostensibly were going to be, well, principles-based? The current collection of international standards now runs to 2,400 pages; even there, rules-based thinking has picked up momentum.

The real problem is enforcement. For instance, the Securities & Exchange Commission still operates with this bit of institutionalized juvenilia, this fig-leaf code of ethics that virtually encourages people to break the law, where white-collar crooks can get off the hook by settling SEC enforcement actions, while neither having to admit nor deny their wrongdoing.

Executives know they’ll only get a slap on the wrist and have to pay tiny fines versus the fat compensation they get from monkeying around with their earnings reports–and that their companies instead will have to pay for their crimes by settling any lawsuit with shareholder money and insurance policies.

In accounting, always remember this: Figures don’t lie, but liars figure. That will always be the case under any accounting regime. “Any set of rules will be subject to someone’s interpretation. The rules will only be as good as those who use them,” says Shelley Jacobson-Taylor, a New York City enrolled agent. And by the way, that interpretation will still require lots of paper. So stay bullish on International Paper (nyse: IP news people ).

17 October, 2007 Posted by George Ng'ambi | Uncategorized | | No Comments Yet