Nairobi, April 21 -- During the American presidential campaign back in 20008, Senator Barack Obama remarked that you may put lipstick on a pig but it remains a pig, and kicked off a minor furore, especially among the PC brigades and sundry feminists, because it concerned a woman.

Turns out that this expression is a pretty regular one and, in this context, it was speaking to the inexperience of John McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin, who was such a greenhorn in politics at any level and was obviously a novice, and soon the storm set off by Obama's remark quickly subsided.

Recently, right here in Tanzania, I thought someone was trying to put lipstick on a pig in another context, but the underlying meaning of the metaphor is quite the sam...