The curious case of taxing on social media in uganda.

The news coming out as the parliament approving the social media taxes, other africans just can't stop laughing at ugandans.
It's funny. Am among the people who are laughing behind curtains but till i come out and tell them am certain many are going to pay the 200ugx everyday for the taxes on facebook, whatsapp and twitter.
200uganda shillings is about 0.053usd. sounds like small money to you?
Imagine a ugandan paying that everyday just to gossip on facebook. Wait.. plus paying for internet too.

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It can be a governments way of opressing these poor souls like many think or it can be a governments way of encouraging or forcing creativity.
On my side I don't give a f because i have better alternatives to whatsapp twitter and Facebook but more on that later.

But why uganda?

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Yes, as a ugandan you can sit down and try to imagine alot of things.
How better a world would have been without taxes on these social media.
Remember at this time, many youths have built empires on social media.

The tax comes at a time when several youths are creating a source of livelihood off the internet thanks to social media. With high unemployment rate, the internet has largely been one of the best hopes for African job market.

From matooke village

Uganda is among the poorest countries in the world, as much as social media has led to some unemployment levels, taxing it will interefere with some Businesses based on these social media.
Of recent many products have been advertised on social media for free and right now even the poorest person in the village who can do it for free is going to pay for it

“African governments are worse than our colonisers. The difference between the two is that colonisers didn’t pretend to like and care about the people”,

Danaiishe Otule from Ghana said.

Steemit can be one of the solutions that can help some of us Ugandans, for now? Hope this turns out to be entirely true.
We shall promote steemit, some people will saved from all this facebook drama.

Thinking about those people who built business empires based on these social media will have to pay daily, and as if 200ugx is small for now, it's likely that figure pushes to 1000ugx next year.
Just keep watching the space.

In July this will be happening. Hope the returns for most steemians turn out to be so good.

Thanks for passing by.
As always
@tesaganewton