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I have no problem with Mr. Kwame Pianim saying that he is prepared to put his hand in fire as a way of vouching for the incorruptibility of President John Evans Atta Mills. It is good to be told by a prominent citizen, politician and businessman like Mr. Pianim that President Mills is not, and will never be, one of those African Presidents who loot the national treasury and, consequently, impoverish the country and the people. Still, though I do not bear Mr. Pianim and President Mills any grudge, I feel bound to ask one or two questions. The second paragraph of the report of Mr. Pianim�s statement in The Daily Guide of Tuesday December 8, 2009 states, �According to him (Mr. Pianim), he had been present on at least two occasions when President Mills returned �brown envelopes� which had been offered him as bribe, something he (Mr. Pianim) did not see under ex-President Jerry John Rawlings and John Agyekum Kufuor.� On PEACE FM�s Kokrokoo Morning Show of Wednesday, December 9, 2009, Mr. Gabby Otchere Darko of the Danquah Institute confirmed this report. He was not contradicted by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) panelists on the show. Did Mr. Pianim mean to state that in the different times of Mr. Rawlings and Mr. Kufuor, he (Mr. Pianim) actually saw people offering bribes, which the two ex-presidents took? Or, was he told by eye-witnesses that the two former presidents took bribes which were offered them? If nothing of the sort happened, if he himself did not witness a scene of bribe-giving and taking, if he was never informed by any eye-witness that the two ex-presidents took bribes offered them in �brown envelopes�, what was the point or relevance of that statement? I do not wish to believe that Mr. Pianim intentionally set out to elevate President Mills, while denigrating the two former presidents. That would be too bad, unless he had incontrovertible evidence that the two ex-presidents had itchy palms. Look at the �evidence� which Mr. Pianim presents as proof of President Mill�s perceived incorruptibility. According to Mr. Pianim�s account, President Mills had refused, on at least two different occasions, an open offer of bribes. If, on two different occasions, at least, people openly offered President Mills a bribe, then those bribe-givers were incredibly audacious, incredibly stupid, unbelievably na�ve, utterly shameless, impudent, and also had such a low opinion of President Mills, as to think that he (President Mills) was so morally bankrupt that he would accept a bribe in full view of witnesses, one of them (Mr. Pianim) not in his political camp. Dear reader, it takes an inveterate or congenial bribe-taker to accept bribes in the presence of witnesses. In the first place, in our country, it is a criminal offence to offer or take bribes. Why would a law professor risk being charged with receiving bribes, and possibly going to jail? And a President at that! Secondly, apart from the legal aspect, there is the moral dimension to bribe-taking. Both the bribe-giver and the bribe-taker know that it is morally wrong to engage in the practice. Consequently, the practice is never publicised, as it takes place in a hush-hush manner. Even where the aggrieved bribe-giver (aggrieved because he may have been forced against his will to give the bribe) tells somebody, he at the same time tells his listener not to broadcast the information. Indeed, unless forced to do so, he will never go to court to give testimony against the bribe-taker. So what is the big deal if President Mills exercised due discretion by refusing to accept a bribe in the presence of witnesses? I am sorry to state that the �evidence� which Mr. Pianim presents as proof of President Mills incorruptibility, is so porous, so threadbare, and so comical, that he should have stopped at expressing his confidence in President Mills� incorruptibility, and left it at that. A prostitute offers service in private. Even a nymphomaniac does not strip herself naked and lie down in the open for every male passer-by to have his fill. Did Mr. Pianim actually expect President Mills to behave worse than a prostitute in bribe-taking, by accepting the bribes offered so openly? Mr. Pianim told his audience that on the two or so occasions, when those impudent people insulted the President by openly offering him a bribe, he (Mr. Pianim) was present. I ask? Was he with the President by fortuitous circumstances, or was he with him at his (President Mills�) invitation? When did the reported abortive bribe-giving take place? At the President�s office or home or where? And what day and date did the two separate cases of alleged bribe-giving take place? Note something else. According to Mr. Pianim, two different individuals, or two different groups of individuals, on two separate occasions, tried to bribe the President. Who are these persons who did not have any respect for our President to the point that they thought he would accept bribes in front of witnesses? President Mills might have forgiven the first person, or group of persons who tried to bribe him. Why was he so lenient the second time another person or group of persons tried to bribe him in full view of witnesses? Why did he not emphatically proclaim his abhorrence of bribe-giving and bribe-taking by reporting them to the police? Or was he obeying the Biblical injunction to forgive wrong-doers seventy-seven times seven? Note this one too. Mr. Pianim said that in any country where there was corruption, the head of state was corrupt too. The logical conclusion is that if Ghana�s President is not corrupt, then Ghanaians are not corrupt. Is that so? Let me make one thing perfectly clear. I have no axe to grind. I have no reason to believe that President Mills is corrupt or corruptible, though I believe that each mortal being has his price. I have nothing against Mr. Pianim either. At one time, he and I were on the teaching staff of the T. I. Ahmadiyya Secondary School, Kumasi, where he taught for one year after his Higher School Certificate Examination (HSCE), before he left for the university. Since then, our paths have crossed once or twice. I respect him for what he has been able to achieve for himself as an economist, politician and businessman. However, as the literally, politically, intellectually and journalistically big-eyed Abdul Malik Kweku Baako often puts it these days, if people have the right within the law to express an opinion, then the rest of us also have the same right to �interrogate� what is stated by others. This is the spirit in which I have also expressed my opinion on Mr. Pianim�s statement about the perceived incorruptibility of President Mills.