Wits students take the test

As part of the ongoing My Hands Are Clean campaign, Corruption Watch’s mobile polygraph arrived at Wits University yesterday, to raise awareness of the dangers of corruption, and encourage students to not get involved in such activities.

The event was organised by Tina Power, chairperson of Students for Law and Social Justice, and a campaigner for the Unite Against Corruption coalition. The event’s MC was dj Zabalaza Mchunu. “We are here to tell people that they must stop being corrupt,” Mchunu told Wits Vuvuzela. “It’s clear that the country is under siege from lots of corruption, and the NGO Corruption Watch took the responsibility on itself to … come to the young people who are still going up the corporate or government ladder.”

Besides the bribe detector, students could leave their anti-corruption message on a sheet for all to see, hand themselves and their electronic devices over to a traditional healer to be symbolically cleansed of all corrupt material, wash their hands free of corruption with soap, and take selfies of themselves against the striking anti-corruption banner.

As with other CW events, the polygraph test, which can take up to two to three hours, was condensed to suit the event. The idea behind taking the test is not to prove that one has never paid a bribe, but rather to confess that one has, and then commit to never paying a bribe again. It is operated by a professional polygrapher.

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