COLUMN: MIND YOUR LANGUAGE. Fuel prices increase: “people need to prepare”!

DAR ES SALAAM: THE increase in the prices of petrol, diesel and kerosene is not an April 1 Fools’ Day scare. It is real and all the papers of April 2, carried frontpage headlines to show the concern.

“Fuel Price Outcry”, shouted the Good Citizen in thick black ink. The Custodian put it as follows: “MPs concerned on EWURA’s 33% cap price increase”. The Daily Blog gave some hope: “Government moves to address fuel prices”.

While one regulator, the Water Utilities Regulatory Authority (EWURA) allowed a 33% increase in fuel prices, another regulator, the Land Transport Regulatory Authority (LATRA) was all against fare increases without the approval of the Authority, despite the non-disputable evidence that the price of fuel has gone up.

A page 3 news item in the Good Citizen, titled: “Operators caution of losses as fuel costs hit record levels”, carried both the concerns of the regulator and of the transporters. The Director General of LATRA, Mr HS: “urged operators to remain calm.

He reassured ‘passengers’ that LATRA seeks to balance service sustainability, with protection against sudden fare increases”.

Should this message be addressed to passengers only? According to the Cambridge Dictionary, a passenger is: “a person who travels in a vehicle – such as a car, bus, train, plane, or ship – but is not operating it, piloting it, or working as a crew member.

They are essentially travellers riding along, distinct from the driver or staff responsible for the vehicle’s operation”. The LATRA DG was not addressing just passengers. He was addressing the general public, including potential travellers, transporters and business persons.

Fuel prices affect everybody. The Executive Director of the Tanzania Association of Oil Marketing Companies (TAOMAC), Mr RM, is quoted as: “urging ‘citizens’ and businesses to reduce fuel consumption”.

Well, fuel increases do not just affect “citizens”! Non-citizens in the country are adversely affected as well. Mr RM said something more: “Next month, prices are likely to increase further, when new imports dominate the market. All goods will become more expensive.

People need to prepare”. “People need to prepare” is inadequate, or needs to be reformulated. He could have said: “People need to prepare themselves”; or, “People need to be prepared (for the hard times to come). Page 2 of the Custodian carried this colourful photograph, whose caption attracted my attention: “Muheza District Commissioner, AS (R, squatting) and the District’s CCM Parents’ Wing Secretary, NA, plant ‘a tree’ at yesterday’s launch of a tree-planting drive at the District Hospital”.

ALSO READ: Joint tourism efforts boost sector growth

How come that two highranking officials are planning just one tree in the full glare of other officials and onlookers? It just does not make sense. In any case, the two officials planting one tree are not squatting. “Squatting” means: “to sit or cause (oneself) to sit on one’s heels”. These officials are actually kneeling.

To kneel means: “To go down or stay in a position where one, or both knees, touch the ground”. This is what is demonstrated in this photograph. Sadly, the carnage on our roads is not showing signs of reducing.

One, involving a bus, happened recently in Singida. Six people were reported dead and 55 injured. This accident is the subject of an editorial in the Custodian (page 8). An unrepaired pothole, is considered to have been the cause of the front tyre burst that led to the bus overturning. The editor lamented this; but praised how the people, at the scene of the accident acted towards the affected. “Stealing wasn’t too visible”.

The editorial writer went on: “This is commendable as there are times when ‘insensitive’ individuals ‘pickpocket’ the dead or the seriously injured instead of helping with rescue efforts”. “Pickpocketing the dead and the injured?” I would go for “ransacking”. Wishing you, readers, a very happy Easter! lusuggakironde@gmail.com