Day 207: The Free Press in Tanzania

If there’s one thing Tanzanian society deserves credit for, it’s a healthy press.  Given that the country only reverted to multi-party democracy in 1992 and opened the door to independent expression, it is remarkable how diverse and engaging it can be.

Even the old standard Daily News, still owned by the government and serving as it’s official mouthpiece, occasionally manages to rise above itself and get downright interesting.  Last Saturday’s top headline trumpeted that the alleged poisoning of a sitting MP and leading critic of government corruption was a ‘hoax’.  Still, the story ran.  The Director of Criminal Investigation was waiting for the final report from the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare before deciding whether to chase after those who had ‘orchestrated the claims’ of poisoning.  The Director then changed the subject to the good news of a declining crime rate and the disturbing rise in gruesome traffic fatalities, always a good distraction.

An interesting article for teachers:  National exam results for form 4 (roughly equivalent to our grade 11) were poor this year in the Tanga region.  Some schools had no Chemistry, Biology, Physics or English teachers.  Textbooks had to be shared one per seven students.  Schools had no libraries, laboratories,  running water or food for students or teachers.  As a result, some students were reported as having ‘low morale’.  One school with 380 students was run by four teachers.  The director of another school bemoaned the rate at which new teachers absconded.  Back in the old days, he reminisced, the consequence for absconding was a stint in the National Service.  Nothing like the threat of boot camp to put a rod in one’s spine.

More about teachers:  40 teachers launched a sit-in at a district headquarters to demand payment of their subsistence allowance.  The District Education Office tried to placate them by offering them pay for four days instead of the seven for which they were owed, with a promise to ‘work around the clock’ to try to find the outstanding funds.  The Office chief complained that his district did not have as good access to revenue streams as some other districts.

Our Umoja graduates now in a good secondary school

Hard working math students on Saturday!

School cooks hamming it up for me

On page 8 I found an ‘Astro-Tour of February Night Skies over Tanzania’.  Relieved that there was more happening here besides poverty and corruption, I read with interest that Tanzania was remarkably free of light pollution, thanks to the ineffectual efforts of the electricity generating people, and might someday become a mecca for star-gazing tourists.

This thought had already occurred to me while climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro one night, at an altitude of almost five thousand metres in total darkness.  The night sky was amazing.  And unfamiliar.  At eight in the evening Orion is almost directly above.  If you’re getting on in years and find yourself up in the middle of the night, you might glance over at the northern horizon to see Ursus Major doing a surprising flip.  Look south and you’ll see constellations you never saw before.  For example, there’s a ‘False Southern Cross’.  Who knew?

According to my article, February 29 will be a big night because all the visible planets will be out in the early part of the night.  Mercury should be just above the horizon at 7 pm (the sun sets here shortly after 6).  Venus and Jupiter will be right behind at about 30 and 40 degrees respectively, joined by a half moon at 50 degrees.  Mars will just be rising in the east.  Then wait until 10pm for Saturn to rise.  Being on the equator makes the solar system very neat, with everything following the sun’s path directly overhead from east to west.

I then turned to The Citizen.  It’s a good read if you want to catch up with what’s happening around the world, usually with an interesting African perspective.  It also usually cites the names of real authors at the top of its pieces, unlike the Daily News with citations like ‘By reporter’, or ‘By Correspondent’ which can sometimes mean someone from India, judging by the content.

In Uganda, I read, civil society leaders are expressing outrage that the sitting government just rewarded all MPs with Ush103 million each to buy luxury cars.  It was demanded of the Speaker of the House that she explain this action.  She expressed shock – that she hadn’t got her’s yet.  She explained:  the problem wasn’t the cars, it was the economy, which was annoyingly slow in generating the kind of revenue necessary to keep a politician in wheels.

Back streetscape in Arusha

Again on the Tanzanian education front, it was reported that exam cheating was on the rise.  Over 3000 students had their national results cancelled in October due to cheating.  182 were caught with notes on them, 3 had other people sit in for them, 2896 produced booklets with similar answers to other people, and 155 had different handwriting in the same booklet.  Eight apparently gave up and wrote obscenities in their booklets.  At least creativity does not seem to be suffering.

Then there was the issue of the doctor’s strike in Dar es Salaam.  They walked out over poor working conditions and low pay.  According to one editorial, they get Sh10,000 a day which works out to a little over $6, while sitting MPs just voted themselves a raise from Sh70,000 to Sh200,000 per day.

At least things haven’t got to the state of affairs in Uganda where, in addition to the luxury cars, the president just pushed through a requisition for an additional Ush92 billion to help pay the bills for his meals, drinks and entertainment.  Five months earlier, Parliament already approved an increase for him of Ush67 billion.  Together this would double the State House budget over last year.  Meanwhile, the Health Ministry couldn’t find Ush7b for children dying of the nodding disease in northern Uganda.

But what’s the point?  Everyone knows that corruption runs rampant here.  I think the point is that the press is doing its best to make the rascals own up to their shenanigans.  Democracy has only a little to do with elections; a much bigger part is creating transparency, and for that we need a vigorous free press.  When Africa finally gets its act together, and I believe it eventually will, it will be these ‘ink-stained wretches’, in Allan Fotheringham’s words, who will to a large extent be the heros of the struggle.

I save for the last my favourite paper, the local Arusha Times.  Unlike the crummy tabloids that litter the subway floors in Toronto and London with their newswire ripoffs, this paper really shows how to do local right.  The reporters are here, on the ground, telling people what’s going on in their own community and how the larger events will affect them.  They also are fearless in the face of corruption, incisive in seeing through the buffoonery of local officials, and possessed of a robust sense of humour.

Daladala and delivery wheelbarrow

Downtown Arusha

Back on the education beat:  37 errant students are being held by authorities in the Longido District for damaging school property.  They claim they weren’t being taught even while their fees were being jacked up.  They were also being charged medical treatment fees for services that are supposed to be free.  They wanted the school director dismissed.  Their punishment is yet to be decided.

Some great opinion columns:  One writer finds himself in a taxi when it is pulled over by the police.  The officer orders him out of the car and gets in himself, taking the driver to the police station where he is fined Tsh30,000 for having an unsafe front tire.  The reporter then takes it upon himself to do an informal survey of the condition of the tires of 30 random daladalas in town.  He finds most of them with tires in worse condition than the one his taxi driver had.  He now continues his investigation to find who owns these vehicles and, surprise!  21 out of 25 are owned by active police officers.  Naturally he wonders why these daladalas continue to ply the roads imperiling everyone, “…while my poor cab driver with only this sinful soul of mine is penalised heavily for endangering my worthless life?”  Worthless?  No, priceless.

Then, rather than wait for next week, the writer packs another zinger into the same column.  His friend’s house is on fire.  The fire brigade arrives, siren wailing.  But there’s no water in the truck, so they stand around with all the neighbours and watch it burn to the ground.  Next time he sees the fire brigade, they’re conducting road checks on daladalas to see if they have fire extinguishers; if not, the drivers are forced to buy one then and there, from, you guessed it, the fire brigade.  Makes sense, thinks our author.  They can’t fight fires, so they might as well switch to the prevention business.  But where does the money go, he wonders, raised by selling fire extinguishers?  Not for water, apparently.

Finally an article too intriguing to ignore:  ‘TFDA Destroys Drugs Alleged to Boost Teats’.  It seems a lot of expired commodities, banned cosmetics and counterfeit drugs were circulating in the market.  Some caches had been nabbed by the ever vigilant Tanzanian Food and Drugs Authority in Arusha and destroyed.  While the contraband included various skin toning cosmetics and tanning creams, what caught the writer’s attention were ‘various drugs for enlarging female bosoms and bottoms’.  Look out for a lot of flat-chested rakes in Arusha next time you’re in town!