Two weeks
ago Monday (yes, I am more than a little behind time wise.. haha) there was a Dala Dala (minibus) strike in town because of increasing
fuel prices and other costs to run them. Every dala dala going within a certain
vicinity in town only costs 300 TSH (Tanzanian shillings) one way regardless of
how long or short your ride is. They were saying that the costs had increased
significantly and that they should be charging more like 500 TSH to ride the
dala dala, which would make it unaffordable to most citizens.
The beauty of this strike, beyond
the fact that I let myself pay for the more expensive piki piki (motorbike)
ride to town, which was beautiful, was that the students excitedly protested in
the streets because they were not able to get to school. Around the centre of
town they swarmed cars and stopped traffic causing a bit of chaos in the area.
It was great to see the youth actively standing up for themselves here! Since
then I have heard of several other youth protests going on (peacefully that is)
throughout the country on the news. University students shut down political
hearings last week because they were upset that so called ‘public’ hearings
were not held publicly about a bill to change parts of the country's
constitution. Unlike in Canada, these actively engaged citizens were thankfully
successful in stopping the process from continuing merely by continuing to clap
soo long that the speaker was unable to be heard and continue to speak. I must
admit that every time I hear about the youth here standing up for their rights,
whether the protests are successful or not, I get really excited. I wish that
things could be more successful in Canada...
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