Tanzania Cancels Independence Day: The Price of 'Stability'
The official line is 'unrest.' The unsaid reality, as the BBC itself notes, is that the opposition planned protests against 'post-poll killings.' So, rather than address the killings or the legitimacy of the recent election results, the government opted to cancel a holiday meant to commemorate the very freedom they're now crushing. One might wonder, how many national holidays would the US cancel
if they acted on every protest against questionable elections or politically motivated violence? This isn't just about 'unrest;' it's about control. A state prioritizes avoiding public dissent over celebrating its own declared sovereignty, a sovereignty undermined when its citizens are met with force for questioning results. A true mark of independence is the right to peacefully dissent, not the
suppression of it under the guise of maintaining order. (Perhaps the 'order' they refer to is the one where their power remains unchallenged.)