Like last Friday, let us touch on the internet
once more...
Early this week I was at some private function
when a drunken individual claimed the Internet has become the main global government.
“Facebook
and Mark Zuckerberg”, she charged, “rule the world! You can rally for votes on
Facebook. You can sell yourself on Facebook. It is free. You don’t need a
passport or money. Immigration is
through the internet....and ... (she paused to belch and... a hiccup)... The
Internet is the most powerful government. You don’t need to pay taxes. You can
say what you want. You can send pictures. You can criticise. You can search and
find and do anything. Russia and USA and Japan and the UK and Germany are no
longer the leaders of our world. The internet is...”
Ernest Hemingway, the 1954 Nobel Prize winning
American novelist, once wrote: “An intelligent person is sometimes forced to be
drunk to spend time with fools.”
Words of a drunk, rhetorical or not...let us
pause and reflect.
Like water, toilets and beds, the internet is
our reality.
Not a day passes without any of us- internet
users- receiving something worth spending A FEW MINUTES ON.
Last week, I was forwarded an audio recording.
Voice of a young woman.
I presumed
she was young; otherwise her story wouldn’t involve sex. No names, no dates, no
sources. The voice of the presumed victim began casually. Some of you might
have heard of this ongoing, casually delivered, Kiswahili tale.
Listen.
She has
just been swimming around the Upanga, Posta Mpya area of Dar es Salaam.
As she strolls back and searching for a Bajaj to
take her to Kariakoo, a tantalizing luxurious car, driven by a handsome young
male, picks her up. As I listen I am thinking
no way (not even in a million years) would a London woman jump into a car just
because the driver is convincing and good looking.
How desperate are our young African women today?
Anyway, once inside the vehicle the subject
settles to listen to the “smooth operator” (to paraphrase the 1980s song by
Nigerian- British musician, Sade). He suggests going to some restaurant first.
Again, the woman complies. However, instead of
heading south, towards her planned destination, the car shoots northwards to-
not just Selandar Bridge- but eastwards to Kenyatta Drive and eventually Toure
Drive vicinity. The woman’s nightmare has just begun...
Big time...
Bit time.
The man
twists the dialogue, ever smooth and suave and finally they are at a huge
location for sex slaves- playing pornographic movies. According to this 20
minute narration – women are tricked then kidnapped to this secluded private
place. Eventually our protagonist manages to escape, running wildly and, lucky
enough to live to tell the tale.
As soon as I stop listening, I get busy.
I scatter
the 20 minute audio clip.
I find out one third of my sources have heard
about this, while majority are unaware. One young radio journalist philosophises: “Dar
has six million people. There are a lot of tragedies these days...”
An ex classmate, (around my age) speculates, these
incidents do occur, but, rarely.
I go back
to the clip.
Listen again.
The lady
insisted prayers, her will power, audacity and belief in God helped as she ran
breathlessly from her ordeal.
One A- level student insists that these days
young women have lost moral and self-respect values. If it is not Kigodoro dance
it is chasing after older men in cars, called “Madanga”, a new word describing
Sugar Daddies.
I am still racking my brains.
If young
women are being kidnapped- then the media is sleeping. The Secret Sex Trade.
However, there is a bottom line.
Number one.
All over the world, women are always wary of
jumping into cars driven by strangers.
It is common sense. Date rape, car rape (and so on) is the reality
or as London youths say “ear- ditty”- (Reality).
Number two.
Desperation.
In London, and many parts of Europe you find women
hopping into cars. But these are sex workers. Abundant in certain, notorious
zones of big cities. Dressed for the occasion. High heels. Tight skirts. Thick
Lip Stick. Whispers. Strictly business. The males know what they are picking
and women likewise. The sex act is monetary and mutually agreed.
In Africa, such desperation is due to what this
column discussed here seven days ago.
Less than
20 percent of our people go past secondary school. The rest, still in their
early twenties, end up jobless, money less, futureless; victims.
Any source of money for hope, shelter, housing,
food is welcome. The risk and dangers are nothing. Desperation is the key and
well, what else do we need?
Education.
Formal Education.
Education....!
-Published in Citizen Tanzania , 17 August 2018
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