Disregard for rule of law during pandemic may end up being the normIt is Milton Friedman who asserts that there is nothing as permanent as a temporary government programme. In the last three months since the virus mutated from an outbreak in China’s Hubei province into a global pandemic, governments all over the world have initiated far-reaching programmes, principally to quell the pandemic. No wonder Italy initially laughed off calls to apply invasive lockdown measures until the pandemic got out of hand and they applied measures hitherto inconceivable in liberal Europe. Secondly, in many jurisdictions, central governments have used the opportunities granted by Covid-19 to expand their mandates vis-à-vis local governments. Counties, which have to manage local health interventions and oversee local health facilities, have to hope for goodwill from busy Nairobi.

Source: Standard Digital May 02, 2020 09:22 UTC