This archive report was first published on 7 October 2019.
On October 4, 2019, Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli commended a government official who was filmed caning students in a viral video.
The students were caned by Mbeya Regional Commissioner Albert Chalamila after they were allegedly caught with mobile phones, which had been confiscated by the school administration.
According to Magufuli, the students had torched two dormitories, and he praised Chalamila for giving them 'few strokes.'
Magufuli also directed Chalamila to expel all 392 Form 5 and Form 6 students in the school and disband the school board.
The President stated that the government could not afford to build classrooms and then have students burn them, and that parents should be made to pay for rebuilding the damaged buildings.
Magufuli also suggested that corporal punishment should be reintroduced in schools, and that human rights activists should rebuild the torched buildings.
