Asaam (Ash), Aug 20, GNA - Mr Peter Abum Sarkodie, the Member of Parliament for Asante Mampong, has taken the fight against corruption to rural communities with a call on chiefs and other leaders to spearhead the anti-corruption drive.

Addressing a durbar of queenmothers and the people of Asaam near Asante Mampong on Friday, he said traditional leaders should be at the forefront of the fight against corruption.

He said chiefs and queenmothers, as the vanguard and custodians of the country's cultural and moral values, should embrace the anti-corruption crusade and weed out misfits from their chiefdoms. The MP reminded all stakeholders that no development would take place if there was rampant corruption.

He said the government's declaration of "Zero Tolerance for Corruption'' was a realisation of the immense damage that corruption had done to society since time immemorial and a show of the government's political will to combat and eradicate the it. "The intensity of the fight against corruption should just be the same as that against HIV/AIDS, where the fight has started to yield positive results."

He identified "integrity, honesty, national pride and self dedication as virtues to be inculcated in our society to combat the scourge".

The MP said it is not the duty of the government and the police alone but every one's responsibility to fight corruption. Nana Obea Brenya II, the Queenmother of Asaam, said she was unhappy that the invasion of the fashion industry and the support the media gives it because this has made the youth to devalue their dignity through provocative and immodest dressing.

She therefore called for education on character building and moral uprightness and the creation of awareness about the negative and destructive impact of these negative trends on the individual, family, and the nation.