We are entitled to our opinion but not to our own facts IMHO

Recently I have noted, online and in the media, the proliferation of articles, blog entries, commentaries that touch on historical facts with blatant distortion shrouded at times in half baked information and often drawing on ‘wacky’ conspiracy theories.

A few of us on Twitter started a conversation on this in particular about Freemasonry. Yet it appears many people do not understand the significance of this misrepresentation of historical facts and propagation of false ‘myths’ and at times outright racist/misogynistic distortions.  

Let us take this issue of Freemasonry. Today many Tanzanians have been made to believe that Freemasons are everywhere in Tanzania, they are bloodsuckers, they have to kill humans as rites of passage, they control the world and every successful and rich person is a Freemason etc.

Two historians – Michael Baignent and Richard Leigh have done extensive research about Freemasonry and had an interesting take on so called myths and history. They argue that if propagated for long – such myths or fallacies eventually become the ‘truth’ and eventually history. 

“The lies of a people or a culture... – hyperbole, the exaggeration and embellishment, even the outright falsification and invention – are not purely gratuitous. On the contrary, they bear witness to underlying wants … lacks .. dreams and ..overcompensation. .. And to that extent they serve to crystallize a collective identity or self definition, they create a new truth – or create something which becomes true.” – Michael Baignet & Richard Leigh “The Temple and the Lodge”

So when for those of us who are aware of historic facts that are documented and researched, keep quiet while fallacies and lies are propagated we are guilty of ‘creating a new truth’ that is difficult to eventually undo.

Recently I was outraged when a blogger claimed that homosexuality (new ‘strain’) started in 14^th century. I demanded the retraction of this because it is a blatant lie, deliberate distortion of documented facts. Instead of debating this and citing sources and even links, the author spent time trying to bend the conversation his way by 1. Trying to imply that I am defending homosexuality for ‘conflict of interest’ (whatever that means!) 2. It is his opinion that he is entitled to 3. He is citing ‘independent’ history

I withdrew from that discussion and refuse to take part in any discussion that is based on fallacies and seeks to be self –prophesying  ‘truth’. We should all as Tanzanians – educated and armed with enough knowledge - work on ensuring that any distortion, fallacy, lie is faced with rigid unbending principled stand. There is no ‘ifs’ ‘buts’.

Let us imagine that a prominent American media commentator would start a discussion saying that “Tanzania got its independence in 1980 only one year before Zimbabwe therefore it will go down the same path like Zimbabwe”. And when we argue that Tanzania it got its independence in 1961, he would respond “It’s my opinion I am entitled to it! So do you agree that Tanzania will go down same path as Zimbabwe or not?”! Ridiculous, we would say. Well this is what is happening right now here with silly articles about Freemasonry, homosexuality and other subjects!

So I want to emphasize that - we are entitled to our own opinions but not our own facts, IMHO

slimcony on change Tanzania: Migongano baina ya wazanzibari na watanganyika hai...

slimcony on change Tanzania: Migongano baina ya wazanzibari na watanganyika hai...: Interraction baina ya wazanzibari na watanganyika haikuanza baada ya muungano mwaka 1964. Kwa mujibu ya wazee waliotutangulia, wanadai, hapo...

Volunteerism and Philanthropy in Tanzania

Recently I was honored to be part of a unique philanthropic action of Flaviana Matata when she donated 500 life vests to the government agency – Marine Services Limited in Mwanza. What struck me was that this young girl was taking a different approach from her peers and even others. Usually our philanthropists who would raise funds from others or be guests of honors and buy auctioned items etc. But the fact that Flaviana personally ordered the life vests paid for everything until the delivery of the life vests to Mwanza makes this action unique. It shows a very focused and personal involvement in her charity activity. And that got me thinking.

If Flaviana would not have acquired the true spirit of volunteerism from her time as Miss Universe Tanzania she would probably have continued to look at any charity activity as simply making an event and raising funds. So philanthropy is volunteerism taken to a higher level once the individual is in position to spend not only his/her time but money as well. But the dedication, involvement and focus have to remain in order to make any philanthropy matter.

One of the most important thing that we need to instill in our young ones is the spirit of volunteerism. This has to be nurtured and cannot be forced. It is important also that when steering the young ones toward taking on volunteer actions that they should have a personal dedication to the given cause. We cannot force them to be active in environment when they do not understand or truly identify with the cause.

But most importantly is that we need to make them understand that volunteerism does not involve any financial or material gain. It is done for achieving the objective of the cause and nothing more. The earlier we instill this in them the better – before they learn what money can buy and before their head is filled by us that ‘nothing is for free in life’

Health awareness and Media

Today I attended a meeting named: “The Promotion of Health Awareness in Tanzania through Media” organized by international media namely RFI, Deutsche Welle, VOA, PRB and Broadcasting Board of Governors. It was a well attended meeting and many interesting inputs, however I had two important observations that I wanted to share with you all.

First and most important is “Who is driving the agenda on health?” Oftentimes we hear as we did today that “health news in media does not sell.” For this reason, all of us in the media tend to seek a ‘partner’ who will fund such stories because we claim, covering it from our own budget is “not worth it”. For this reason we find that often the agenda is driven by the donors and government who fund such programs for one reason or another. What we end up with is stories and reports that reflect such agenda thus a regular viewer may face a barrage of news about HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria or whichever disease or health issue is the ‘trendy’ topic among the donors and other funding bodies. Naturally stories like these do NOT sell because the primary audience is not the viewer or reader or listener but the funding party. IMHO

In order to make health news interesting and sellable, we need to come up with programs, articles, reports that focus on the viewers, readers and listeners. Health is important to everyone and I am convinced that however ‘poor’ we may deem a common mwananchi, they are ready to pay whatever they have, for good health. As we know and probably have seen, heard or experienced, in the unfortunate case of disease people are ready to sell assets and spend their wealth to regain health. Now if we can device an exchange whereby people are able to get information albeit for a small fee then immediately health related news and information will become not only sellable but ‘hot-selling commodity’ IMHO

Now of course this begs the question – how can we do that? I certainly have some ideas but of course in the spirit of this new shift – nothing is for free ;-)  

It has been a while since I posted anything here but as they say "better late than never"
So from today I promise more frequent updates and stop being boring. One of the reasons for the slow update is that I find Twitter and Facebook more gratifying because I get instance feedback to my tweets and posts, however the limitation of words etc is also frustrating. I guess the time has come to become more used to blogging and keep it lively! Cheers! 

Procrastinating as a Nation

Today on Twitter, someone asked me why Tanzanian government loves emergency power solutions. Now the answer could be that because of that 10% issue. But I also responded that it could be related more tightly to our national consciousness of procrastination.

The definition or explanation on Wikipedia points out that, “procrastination refers to the act of replacing high-priority actions with tasks of low-priority, and thus putting off important tasks to a later time.” In other words it is when you have that urgent deadline to meet and you find yourself playing Solitaire on the computer all day long.  Later you work the night through to meet the 8am deadline and feel guilty as you know you had 2 weeks to write the proposal but somehow never got to do it.

The Wikipedia link explains further that, “Some psychologists cite such behavior as a mechanism for coping with the anxiety associated with starting or completing any task or decision. Other psychologists indicate that anxiety is just as likely to get people to start working early as late and the focus should be impulsiveness. That is, anxiety will cause people to delay only if they are impulsive.”

So do we, Tanzania as a nation, procrastinate? Definitely, IMHO! It is something that affects us individually and collectively. We see that in our leaders, when a leader will opt to travel to other countries while tough decisions await solutions and people wait for leadership. We can see the media procrastinate on individual politician’s life or on how much posho MPs get, while not addressing serious issues that require their analysis. We can see the civil servants procrastinate in offices chatting and drinking ‘chai’ while urgent matters pile up. So why do we procrastinate? Are we anxious and stressed to the extent that we are unable to cope? I have no answer but I think it is worth exploring the matter!

If you take this analogy I am sure that you will see how people collectively in your office or in your surrounding procrastinate. I think that is the reason why even in private sector, Tanzanian employees are infamous for not delivering on time and quality or for lacking initiative compared with our ‘aggressive’ neighbors. Yeah, I am aware that there are other factors like education, nutrition etc, but let us factor in this behavior and suddenly it makes more sense.

Let me not say more as I need to get back to meet that deadline which is long overdue.. Cheers! 

Power crisis and National emergency

The Power crisis in Tanzania has been the subject of much discussion in the public sphere particularly online and there is no reason to rehash the same or similar arguments. However what has caught my attention in the Opposition budget read yesterday 15^th June 2011 by Shadow Minister Zitto Kabwe (MP) was the mention of making power shortage a national emergency. This is truly a relief to hear that finally politicians are not falling victim to populism and declaring that “only 10% of Tanzanians have electricity or connected to the National Grid, so this is not a national crisis”

My view is that it is a national emergency because Tanzania as a young country should be looking toward industrialization and catching up with the 21^st century and we should not proudly declare that because we are behind, we don’t intend to catch up at all, IMHO!

First step is to ensure that those already connected to the National Grid and started businesses, factories and enterprises that are depended on electricity, get reliable power. The current ‘small rationing’ is actually a full fledged rationing which makes modern life unbearable and businesses unsustainable. Real economic growth can only happen if Tanzania starts exporting manufactured goods, provide world class services etc.

After ensuring a sustainable supply of power the next step will be to connect the rest of the country to the National Grid. The supply of electricity changes lives in unimaginable way and spurs development – that is not something that anyone of us would argue against.

I believe that even though this was an alternative budget and not the government’s budget but there is no harm in the government lending some of the ideas and implementing them. We need to look at this as an emergency that needs long term solutions and strategy as well as short term solutions.