Media is therefore selling a big deal this time around than any other period, but the October pre-election campaign, thanks to the presidents’ intolerant spirit on the messing public servants, piercing them of their boils as he deems fit.
This zeal by the president has helped to reduce workload in a number of media houses that would otherwise rely heavily on investigative stories to sell their papers.
Likening the duo of Magufuli and Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa with that of the late Father of the Nation, Julius Nyerere and his then-second in command, Premier Edward Sokoine, a friend of mine recently commended their resort in making headlines, swelling the print-runs.
I don’t have a lot to tell you about President Ali Hassani Mwinyi’s reign as I could see only the superficial part of it at a time when I was still a Secondary School student, too young to play smart for things surrounding his tenure.
Though I was still a newcomer to the media profession, I experienced the second term of the former President Benjamin Mkapa, whom I give a thumb-up for his art of making media headlines.
Among the issues I was assigned to cover then was his lecture on the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) the East African States were about to sign with European countries.
His arguments provoked long heated debates in the media, but he stuck to his guns vowing to change no iota in his branding the agreement as hostile to the people in the region.
Hope you would agree with me that even after his retirement, Mkapa had continued to make headlines in the media. I remember the “wapumbavu na malofa” remark he made last year during the launch of Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) campaign rally at Jangwani grounds in Dar es Salaam. It still haunts the ears of most of us.
It is the remark that continued to sell newspapers for weeks until Magufuli and Lowasa joined the podium with their malofa-targetted campaigns. But it is the winner of this presidential race who finally battered headlines to-date.
It is his zeal to corrupt officials, making public officials accountable by keeping his campaign promises of piercing the boils of the idle guys that makes him darling of the media and their wananchi audience.
How I wish I tickled the opposition to rally for boil piercing spirit shown by the president and claim they could even have pierced more boils.
But while I support the presidential boil piercing course, I would love to see his subordinates did not misuse their powers to undermine and hurt the feelings of civil servants for the sake of pleasing the boss on the throne.
I wish the media made headlines by revisiting the recorded images of my dear pal, the Mwanza Regional Commissioner John Mongella as he was threatening to pierce Sumatra official of his boils in the region recently.
Mongella simply attacked the junior Sumatra official with names calling and slandering him in person, next of kin and his private life. He attacked his subordinate’s personality with taunts and guffaw in public.
I was just wondering if respect had anything to do with one’s authority or position as long as one was a human being. I believe that even Mongella’s employer, President Magufuli, a mastermind to the boil-piercing scheme for which trumpeting would reserve his temper for the sake of human respect in this case.
We need to be keen on the choice of language whenever we are performing our duties and avoid personal attacks.
The writer is revised editor, the Guardian on Sunday
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