The idiocy of bureaucracy

May 15, 2010 Editorial

Organisations are not known for commonsense. The bureaucracy often leads to all manner of unreasonable developments. Simple solutions become complex and more often than not, the policies applied are standard and ignore modifications in situations.
There is the story of a bank writing to a woman who had died some time back to inform her that she had an account that had become dormant and that there were charges attached. The dead woman’s son duly informed the bank that the person they sought was dead.
The ensuing dialogue makes for interesting reading. The bank duly informed the son that the woman had to pay the charges. With all the patience he could muster the son informed the bank that the woman would not mind. The person at the bank then said that there would be no option but to send the report to the credit bureau which would blacklist the woman.
Again the son said that the woman would not mind and volunteered the address where the bank could find the old and dead woman. The bank blurted out that the address was a cemetery. Then the son informed the person at the other end of the line that there is the place where dead people go.
This rigid adherence to bureaucracy often makes a mockery of situations. Two days ago, there was this centenarian who needed her identification card so she sent her son to the regional office to uplift the document. Some smart person duly informed her son that he could not uplift he identification card, that the woman must do so herself.
One would have thought that with the woman being 101 years old someone would have recognised the need to waive the bureaucracy. Surely, it would seem that these days, people are not paid to think, that they are paid to perform as robots.
The long and short of it all is that the old woman had to make her way to the regional office. This lawlessness was exposed because a reporter happened to capture the event. The employees were reportedly in shock. Their rush to deal with the old woman outside the office was comical. It was as if they were the most caring people.
The Guyana Elections Commission must be made to explain the training programme through which it passed its staff. Surely it could not be that the staff was so robotic that even the dying had to leave his or her bed to undertake business.
Surprisingly, a few hours later, there was a radio announcement from one of the government departments informing the staff that old people should not be made to visit the offices. It must be that the news travels fast.
But the Guyana Elections Commission is not the only entity that causes old people to undergo undue hardship in pursuit of their benefits. The various post offices have been known to have senior citizens, some of them barely able to walk, standing or huddling under any place that offers shade.
Most of these places do not cater for the disabled. It would seem that the days are long past when institutions had measures in place to cater for the elderly and the shut ins. Is there a penalty for mistreating the elderly? It would seem not although Guyana is a signatory to the convention that seeks to protect the elderly.
There has been no move to discipline those who dragged the centenarian out of her home; there has been no apology from the authorities to the woman.
What makes that situation worse is the fact that this particular old woman had no transportation of her own and could barely move. A village looks after its people so the woman was provided with transportation, free of cost. Perhaps the institutions that make those senior citizens travel long distances at great inconvenience should be made to compensate them financially.

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