Why shoot yourself in the foot?

One of my father's University friends is visiting from the motherland. He is probably among my very favorites of my father's friends. I always enjoy his company partly because he is so funny, but I think mostly because my father is so happy around him.. and together they have caused and continue to cause quite a bit of trouble. Sitting in on a conversation with them always involves a great deal of laughs and that warm feeling that comes when good friends recall fond memories.

The main reason I really enjoy my father's friend is because of his strength of character. I don't think it is easy to explain how easy it is to partake in corruption in a poorly developed country. It is extremely difficult to be both wealthy and honest in such an environment, if not impossible. My father's friend has achieved both. His business is a family business, built over generations and he is living comfortably. The thing that strikes me most is his humility. He is extremely reverent but not in a fundo sense. He is an extremely funny and laid back and generous, but not in an irreverent sense. I don't know how better to describe the unique balance he has achieved.

Listening to him and my father speak and ask about their friends, I become extremely nostalgic for the motherland. There is something so real about being there, something so genuine. It is what it is. What it also is is extremely corrupt. People have to lie to survive, if you don't lie, you're virtually stuck in a downward spiral. My own family is part of the shrinking middle class. I suppose my dad's friend is as well, but he is closer to upper middle class. My uncle is involved in a development organisation founded by my grandfather that works to provide farmers with supplies at cost and train them to improve their techniques to reap higher yields and become self-sufficient. Literacy and preventive health training programs are also tied in, the latter due to my aunt who is a doctor. My uncle has to create the hoops, set them on fire and then jump through them to get anything accomplished. He needs permits for just about everything, which everyone is telling him to ignore but he is intent on doing everything properly. The people he has to deal with are worse than uninterested, they make everything he is trying to accomplish that much more difficult. What I don't understand is why a country with dire need for such efforts by people like my uncle is so intent on frustrating good intentions? People are constantly stealing from the country, from Generals to their sons to their aunt's cousin's nephew's dogs, the well-connected are getting fatter and fatter while the country is slipping farther and farther down the povery spiral. There is immense talent, and even will but the people who want to implement change, don't have the connections and the people who have the connections want to keep the status quo. Where do you go from there?

My father's friend asked my parents, who are both well-educated, why they left. People like them are just what the motherland needs. My mother says that she would never have been allowed to contribute on account of her being a woman, despite her talent and training. She graduated from the first computer science program offered in the country and went on to get her Master's from Canada on scholarship. She would be relegated to answering phones if she stayed there. Why does such a society plagued with poverty and stagnation perpetuate these attitudes of self-destruction? People who want to help are stopped dead in their tracks and the ones who keep choking the roots continue to do so unchecked. There was greatness once, and there is potential for greatness once more. I just wonder how long before it reaches breaking point and the state of development slips into a deeper circle of economic, social and political hell.