“In addition, a number of areas of cooperation will soon have no staff in critical departments SUCH as Labour and Employment, Immigration, Environment…and Civil Society, TO MENTION JUST A FEW.”
In a story appearing on Page 5 of the leading regional weekly of September 13-19, entitled ‘East African Community faces staff crisis…’ a senior EAC official is quoted as purportedly saying:
“In addition, a number of areas of cooperation will soon have no staff in critical departments SUCH as Labour and Employment, Immigration, Environment…and Civil Society, TO MENTION JUST A FEW.”
Hello! When you use a determiner like: “such as,” “for example” or “for instance,” it means there’re others of the ilk that you’re mentioning, but time and space disallows you to state them mall. You can only provide your audience with a few.
So, you don’t need to tell your audience what’s obvious to them. That’s to say, the words in caps are unnecessary.
Page 3 of the Friday, September 19 of the tabloid associated with this columnist is carrying just two stories.
The main one is entitled, ‘Samia pledges 7pc growth “as” CCM intensifies campaigns’ while the other is headlined ‘Tragedy “as” ROADS accidents claim 19 lives in 72 hours.’
At times, being a language critic is about being fussy, to the chagrin of the ordinary user. In our case here, we’ll query: why use the adverb “as” in two headlines that are on the same page? Isn’t it a display of intellectual laziness?
And, by the way, we don’t say roads accidents; we say ROAD accidents.
Page 1 of Bongo’s senior-most broadsheet of Sunday, September 21 there’s a segment entitled, ‘What Voters Say,’ in which interviewees give their view on the kind of leader they want as we head to the October 29 polls.
One is quoted as ostensibly saying: “The leader I want is one who prioritises women’s issues, INCLUDING road improvement, quality health services and economic empowerment.”
Women issues ‘including’ road improvement…? Know what that means? It means, having bad roads is a matter that is specific to women.
This can’t be true, of course, but that’s what the scribbler wrote in his translation to what his source said in Kiswahili. We, however, believe the source said something akin to the following: “The leader I want is one who prioritises women’s issues AND road improvement, quality health services…”
On Page 8 there’s a picture spread with the headline ‘CHAUMA election campaign in photos.’ Therein, one of the photos has a caption that reads: “FUNS and supporters cheer during the campaign rally.”
“Funs” cheering a party they’d like to see ending CCM governance? No way! Persons keen to give everything to ensure you succeed are not your funs.
They’re your FANS who are the same thing as supporters. Members and supporters would be okay. By the way, we’re we suggest that “fans”, should be limited to those with affection towards entertainment or those who provide it.
And then, the Monday, September 22 edition of Bongo’s huge and colourful broadsheet has a Page 1 story with the headline, ‘Adult educators admire 71-year-old exam sitter.’ In Para 2, the scribbler writes in respects to septuagenarian Stivine Lameck who will this year sit for his O-level final exams:
“The candidate for the Secondary School Level Leaving Certificate showed the determination of many PEOPLE ADULTS to take up education challenges regardless of age …” People adults? Oops! This isn’t about our kind of English; it’s about carelessness. We leave it at that.
Page 3 has a story entitled, ‘RC reads riot act as vandals destroy critical city sanitation infrastructure.’ In Para 2 the scribbler, reporting on what Dodoma RC Rosemary Senyamule regarding unconscionable thugs messing up our economy, he writes:
“Senyamule made the remarks yesterday while inspecting sewerage infrastructure in central parts of the city, where several manhole covers were stolen BY UNKNOWN PEOPLE.
Are people who steal usually known? Certainly no! So, why say it? The sentence should’ve simply ended with “stolen.”
