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TANZANIA IN THE INTERNATIONAL MEDIA

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by Donovan McGrath

Decline of fishing in Lake Tanganyika ‘due to warming’ BBC News online published an article by the environment correspondent Matt McGrath on the ‘new research [that] blames rising temperatures … as the key cause of decline in one of the world’s most important fisheries.’ Extract continues: ‘Lake Tanganyika is Africa’s oldest lake and its fish are a critical part of the diet of neighbouring countries. But catches have declined markedly in recent decades as commercial fleets have expanded. However, this new study says that climate warming and not overfishing is the real cause of the problem… The chemical analysis of the cores and the fossils found there indicate that fish numbers have been dropping in parallel with the rise in global temperatures. The scientists say that in tropical lakes a warming of the waters reduce the mixing between oxygenated top layer and the nutrient-rich layer at the bottom. This increasing stratification of the waters means fewer nutrients get to [the] top, meaning less algae which means less food for fish. “Our idea was to look at the fish fossil and record and see when that decline actually started,” said Prof Andrew Cohen from the University of Arizona, “If it happened before the start of industrial fishing in the 1950s, you’d have strong evidence that the decline is not simply driven by this fishing activity and that’s exactly what we found.” The scientists don’t discount the impact of fishing over the past six decades… “Fishing in the lake is a Wild West activity, there are nominal controls but no teeth,” said Prof Cohen…’ (8 August 2016)

Rwanda, Tanzania ban sale of Samsung Note 7, Kenya holds back The East African (Kenya). Extract: ‘Kenya will not join Rwanda and Tanzania in effecting a ban on the importation and distribution of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7, which has been dogged by battery issues that has seen its production terminated… Rwanda and Tanzania effected a ban … citing safety concerns. Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority communication manager Innocent Mungy urged citizens who had bought the Samsung Note 7 to switch it off and return the device where they had purchased it, and sellers to follow the safety instructions provided by Samsung…’ (15-21 October 2016)

‘Seeds of hate’ sown as Tanzania starts LGBT crackdown The (UK) Guardian correspondent Sophie Tremblay says the ‘situation for the gay community deteriorates as ministers partially ban lubricants and restrict pro-gay charities …’ Extract continues: ‘Tanzania’s justice minister has announced controversial new plans to suspend the registration of any charity or non-governmental organisation that supports homosexuality. Claiming that he was protecting the “culture of Tanzanians”, Harrison Mwakyembe’s announcement comes days after the country’s health minister imposed a partial ban on the import and sale of lubricants to discourage gay men from having sex and “curb the spread of HIV”… The sudden crackdown has come as a surprise in a country that has until recently been tolerant of its lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community. Unlike in neighbouring Uganda … Kenya and Zimbabwe, gay Tanzanians have not experienced the same levels of violence and discrimination, and politicians have until now generally ignored the topic. James Wandera Ouma, the founder and executive director of LGBT Voice Tanzania … has said the plans are proof that “the environment for the LGBT community is very bad right now and it’s getting worse.” Ouma said the political mood shifted in early July, when Paul Makonda, the regional commissioner for Dar es Salaam … told citizens during a religious rally that he had started to crackdown against gay people. Makonda said he would use social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook to identify and arrest people suspected of being gay. Ouma said since Makonda’s speech he knew of at least 20 men who had been arrested by police outside bars and clubs popular with the gay community… Though sodomy is a criminal offence punishable by life imprisonment, there is no law prohibiting homosexuality in Tanzania…’ (8 August 2016)

Tanzania suspends U.S.-funded AIDS programs in a new crackdown on gays The Washington Post online. Extract: ‘… Tanzania is turning its antihomosexual fury in a new direction – targeting HIV/AIDS programs that have helped tame a disease that once ravaged the region… [T] he minister of health announced that Tanzania will ban HIV/AIDS outreach projects aimed at gay men, pending a review… Tanzania’s actions appear to mark the first time that a country has suspended parts of the United States’ hugely successful foreign HIV/AIDS initiative in an attempt to crackdown on the gay community… The ban comes after months of bitter speeches and threats from Tanzanian officials aimed at the gay community and at organizations treating its HIV/AIDS patients. This year, police raided two U.S.-funded HIV/AIDS organizations and seized confidential patient information and supplies, officials said. In September, the deputy minister of health, Hamisi Kigwangalla, accused HIV treatment organizations of “promoting homosexuality.” “Any attempt to commit unnatural offenses is illegal and severely punished by law,” Kigwangalla said in the statement. People convicted of same-sex liaisons in Tanzania can be jailed for up to 30 years… But even as assistance programs have sharply reduced the death toll from AIDS, some countries in eastern Africa have been escalating their campaigns against homosexuality… Even though Tanzania’s penal code refers to homosexuality as “gross indecency,” the government had long permitted organizations to help gay men who had AIDS or who were at risk of contracting it. But since John Magufuli was elected president last year, the government’s tolerance on the issue has disintegrated. Although Magufuli has not said anything publicly about homosexuality, a number of his appointees have made harsh remarks… The government also banned the distribution of lubricants that help ensure that condoms do not tear…’ (23 November 2016)

The octopus hunters of Zanzibar BBC News online (UK). Extract: ‘The powdery white beaches of Zanzibar’s east coast are best known as a holiday destination. But each day, as the tide begins to ebb and the beachgoers return to their hotels, a small army of men and women armed with sticks and spears wade out across the coastal flats in search of one of the Tanzanian island’s finest delicacies – octopus. During a single low tide a skilled octopus hunter can spear more than 10 of the slimy invertebrates, which thrive amid the maze of rocks, corals and sea grass that lie beyond the beaches. The catch is highly prized by the island’s tourist hotels and provides an important source of protein for coastal communities. Tanzania is the largest producer of octopus in the western Indian Ocean… Traditionally a female-dominated activity, more men are now turning to octopus for a source of income. “The octopus has helped me to drive my life forward,” said Ali, who makes about £1.90 ($2.30) per kg (2Ib 3oz) for his octopuses. According to data from the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation, catches in Tanzania have increased from 482 tonnes in 1990 to more than 1,250 in 2012…’ (19 October 2016)

Tanzania reiterates total ban on use of plastic bags by next January The East African (Kenya). Extract: ‘The government … will not back down on its decision to ban the use of plastic bags in January [2017]. Owners of plastic bag manufacturing factories have been advised to take the necessary steps to stop production before the deadline, and invest in the production of alternative bags and plastic waste recycling facilities. The instruction was contained in an advertisement posted in various media outlets … by the Vice President’s Office… [T]he Minister of State in the Vice President’s Office, January Makamba … said that by instituting the ban, the government had revisited the 2006 regulation on the production, importation, sale and use of plastic bags …’ (20-26 August 2016)

On Resilience: How Ninon Marapachi Went From Poverty In Tanzania To Wall Street Domination Forbes online (USA) published Ally Bogard and Allie Hoffman’s interview of the 38-year-old Tanzanian woman who works for one of the biggest banks on Wall Street. The following is a summarised extract of the interview beginning with what Ninon Marapachi says about herself when the interviewers posed the question “What would be the most surprising thing about your professional journey that even the people that were closest with you wouldn’t know?”: Ninon answered by saying that the thing she had learned, more than anything throughout her career, was to ask for things, which she always got. Originally from Tanzania, the hardship of her family situation caused her to push herself so hard that to literally think of failure was not an option. She always knew she really needed to make it, because she needed to change her family’s situation. Ninon received a scholarship through the Norwegian government and spent her last two years of high school in Norway. Later, Ninon talks about her early beginnings in Wall Street: “My sophomore year, I started as an intern at Merrill Lynch in NYC. In 2001, 50 of us interns met with a very senior leader. After he presented, I emailed him, thanking him and asking him if he’d be available to talk to me one-to-one. He said yes. I got in front of this senior leader, I told him my story and my background – I told him I’m not American, I don’t have a visa, my family are very poor and I love working in finance. I told him I’d love to be hired, but if they wanted to hire me, then they should hire me as soon as possible, and I gave a very clear deadline for reclassifying and opting to graduate early. It was kind of crazy ask; it just came to me to be that bold. Literally on July 1st, 2001, I got called to his office and he said, ‘You asked for this,’ and there was an offer in front of me. I’ve been there ever since.” Towards the end of her interview Ninon said: “I have a story to tell and I want to impact a lot of people … who might not believe that a black woman can be in finance, an African woman can be on Wall Street…” (16 November 2016)

Taarab maestro’s last lovesong New African magazine. ‘Mohammed Juma Bhalo’s passing robbed the East African coast of one of its brightest lights. Paul Goldsmith celebrates a departed rock star, and traces the history of his art.’ Extract continues: ‘On the night of 5 April 2014, the Taarab music star, Mohammed Juma Bhalo … passed away. He died in his home in the heart of Mombasa’s old town holding his wife’s hand… The singer of traditional Swahili ballads and love songs was born in Malindi, Kenya and went to Tanzania as a young lad, where he worked as a fisherman and at other manual jobs. He returned to Mombasa, where he began to concentrate on his career as a musician… During his heyday … beginning in the late 1960s, Bhalo achieved rock star status across Kenya’s coast and beyond. Taarab is a modern offshoot of a much longer literary tradition. It achieved popularity during the pre-World War II period through the music of the Zanzibari diva, Siti binti Saad. Another legendary member of this cultural tradition, Bi Kidude, will be forever associated with the drums she still beat with vigour as a centenarian… [T]he people of Mombasa accorded Mohammed Juma Bhalo a sending-off worthy of a true Sheikh. Massive crowds formed in the streets around his home to escort the jeneza to the overcrowded mosque …’ (November 2016)

Private schools seek tax waiver The East African (Kenya). Extract: ‘… “The government should equate schools to business institutions and waive taxes to allow the smooth delivery of quality education,” said Peter Nayar, director of Eden Garden Education Trust, which runs a chain of schools. The chairman, of the Tanzania Association of Managers and Owners of Non-government Schools and Colleges Mrinde Mnzava, said that the government should find a way to waive taxes charged on private schools to make them affordable for more Tanzanians…’ (15-21 October 2016)

OBITUARIES

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by Ben Taylor

Aboud Jumbe Mwinyi, former President of Zanzibar, died in Dar es Salaam in August, aged 96. Jumbe is remembered for his major role in bringing stability to Zanzibar after the assassination of his predecessor, the late Sheikh Abeid Amani Karume, in April 1972, and for his controversial stance on the relationship between Zanzibar and mainland Tanzania. Zanzibaris from all sides of the political divide mourned his passing.

A graduate of Makerere University in Uganda, Jumbe joined the Zanzibar Revolutionary Government in January 1964. Prior to Karume’s assassination, he had been the minister of state responsible for Union Affairs, which brought him into close contact with the Union government. It is rumoured that Union President, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, played a decisive role in Jumbe’s rise to succeed Karume.

Mzee Jumbe began to represent Mwalimu on the world stage when Mwalimu himself could not attend. He later agreed quickly to Nyerere’s proposal to merge TANU, the independence party of mainland Tanzania, with the Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP) that ruled Zanzibar, and became vice chair of the new party, CCM.

Jumbe saw a need for change in the politics of Zanzibar as its relations with the Union government became increasingly strained. After the war with Idi Amin, he engineered small changes towards greater democracy. Among other things, this led to a new constitution for Zanzibar and the establishment of the House of Representatives.

But growing calls for either separation from mainland Tanzania or a changed format of the Union could not be silenced forever. With the help of a Ghananian lawyer, Jumbe secretly produced a document in defence of a three-government (Zanzibar, Tanganyika and the Union) structure. But his secret document was stolen from his office and landed in the hands of president Julius Nyerere. On January 29, 1984, he lost four leadership positions: Chairman of the Zanzibar Revolutionary Council, Vice Chair of CCM, Zanzibar President and Vice President of the Union government. Ali Hassan Mwinyi took over as Zanzibar leader, and Jumbe stepped back from political leadership.

President John Magufuli called Jumbe “an important person who devoted himself in the fight for freedom, unity, justice and development of Zanzibaris and Tanzanians in general at a time when the country was passing through difficult times.”

Roland Brown played a significant role in the development of Tanzania and of its international relations throughout most of the first two decades after Independence. During that long period he was one of three British expatriate advisers who worked very closely with President Nyerere and his government. (The others were Joan Wicken, Mwalimu’s personal assistant, and Professor Reginald Green who advised on financial and economic affairs).

Roland had met Nyerere in the UK when Mwalimu was studying there in the 1950s, and thereafter served as a constitutional adviser to him. At Independence, Roland became Tanzania’s first Attorney General (AG), serving between 1961 and 1965. Probably his biggest assignment as AG was to get involved in the top-level discussions following the Zanzibar Revolution in 1964, when Mwalimu asked him to prepare the agreement that was to govern the union of Zanzibar and the Mainland. Reportedly, this was drafted in complete secrecy, even without the knowledge of key Zanzibaris.

After Roland was succeeded as AG by Mark Bomani in 1965, he stayed on in Tanzania as Mwalimu’s adviser on international and commercial legal affairs. Among many other things, he worked on the extensive nationalisations after the 1967 Arusha Declaration – devising, for instance, the legislative framework for the nationalisation of the private commercial banks (which he was given just three days to do).

Mwalimu also ‘loaned out’ Roland for important external assignments. Following the mass riots in the Zambian Copper Belt in the 1960s Roland was asked by Kaunda to head a Commission of Inquiry. Then, in the 1970s, as Rhodesia headed uncertainly to independence, Nyerere nominated Roland to represent Joshua Nkomo in the all-party discussions. He recalled how he sat for several days in the hot train stationed midway across the Victoria Falls Bridge that was the venue for those acrimonious talks, as Mugabe, Nkomo and other nationalist leaders argued out a possible independence scenario with Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith and the South African Prime Minister Vorster.

Roland had left Tanzania in the late-1970s to become Special Adviser (Legal) at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London – in which capacity he continued to advise Tanzania, especially on energy and mineral sector matters. Working closely with Hon. Al Noor Kassum (the Minister for Water, Energy and Minerals) and Andrew Chenge (then an Attorney in the AG’s Chambers), Roland was instrumental in framing Tanzania’s Petroleum (Exploration & Production) Act 1980 – an Act that served the country well for the next 35 years.

In the mid-1980s, Roland moved to New York to become Chief Legal Counsel at the UN Centre for Transnational Corporations (UNCTC), from which position he retired in the 1990s to establish in Sussex a private consultancy, Transborder Investment Advisory Services.

At different points in his career Roland had also been a part time lecturer at Cambridge University and later a visiting research fellow at the Institute of Development Studies in Sussex. He also advised the Labour Cabinet minister Peter Shore for a number of years.

Following the death of his wife, Irene, Roland left the UK more than a decade ago to live with his son in Denmark. He commenced the preparation of a light memoir about the decolonisation period in East Africa, based on his first-hand experience there with Mwalimu and his many meetings with Presidents Jomo Kenyatta, Kenneth Kaunda, Seretse Khama and other leading politicians of the time. In preparing that memoir he was given special access to the FCO files pertaining to that momentous period. It is not known if he finished his thesis before falling ill. He died aged 92 in a Copenhagen nursing home on 14 May 2016.

Former Speaker of the National Assembly, Samwel Sitta, passed away in Germany in November, aged 74.

Mr Sitta entered parliament in 1975, representing Urambo constituency for CCM. He served as Minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs in the early 1990s, supervising the transition to multiparty democracy, and Minister for East African Cooperation and Minister for Transport during President Kikwete’s second term. At various times he also held posts as Director General of the Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) and as a Regional Commissioner. Having failed to win the CCM nomination for president in 2015, he stepped down from active politics.

Sitta will be remembered most for his five-year term steering parliament as Speaker from 2005 to 2010, a period that many see as the time when parliament found its role. He earned a reputation for “speed and standards.” His leadership was instrumental in ensuing the Richmond energy scandal was debated in full in parliament, leading to the downfall of Edward Lowassa as Prime Minister. And he made no secret of his desire to weaken party control – including in his own party CCM – of MPs and parliamentary processes. This approach and his co-authorship of a book, “A parliament with teeth,” lost him support within CCM and the party ensured he did not continue as Speaker after the 2010 elections.

Mr Sitta’s time as chair of the 2014 Constituent Assembly, reviewing the draft national constitution prepared by Justice Warioba, is remembered less fondly by some. Many of his previous supporters in the opposition – who had applauded his appointment as chair of the assembly – were disappointed when Sitta appeared to play a more partisan role than he had done as Speaker.

Nevertheless, Sitta is personally credited by many for the transforming parliament into a respected national institution – and his time as Speaker will be remembered for fruitful, non-partisan debates. Some of the warmest tributes came from leaders of opposition parties. Chadema chairman, Freeman Mbowe, praised Mr Sitta “for freeing Parliament from the shackles of the executive”, and transforming it into an independent organ with powers to fearlessly scrutinise the government. “There’s no other Speaker who came after him who has managed to command the House respect as he did,” said Halima Mdee, also of Chadema.

Former Prime Minister John Malecela described him as the “unsung hero of pluralism” who engineered the transition to multiparty democracy. He ensured that country’s legal framework accommodated changes. President Magufuli praised Mr Sitta for “his hardworking attitude, nationalism and culture of defending truth at various levels of his leadership as a civil servant or politician.

Long-serving cabinet minister, Joseph Mungai, has died in Dar es Salaam after a short illness, aged 73. Mungai had served for 35 years as MP for Mufindi, and held three major ministerial roles. In 1972, under President Nyerere, he became Minister for Agriculture at the age of 28. Later presidents also put their trust in him, appointing him to sensitive dockets as Minister of Education under President Mkapa and Home Affairs under President Kikwete.

In February 2008, Mungai retired, taking the opportunity of Kikwete’s decision to dissolve cabinet following the resignation of Prime Minister Edward Lowassa. He did not leave politics entirely, however. He remained as an MP until 2010, and in 2015 he surprised many when he joined the exodus of many of Lowassa’s supporters from CCM to Chadema when the former Prime Minister became the opposition UKAWA coalition’s presidential candidate.

Minister of Foreign Affairs and East Africa Corporation, Augustine Mahiga, described Mr Mungai as an “icon and true leader”.

Former Mayor of Dar es Salaam, Didas Masaburi, died in October at Muhimbili Hospital in Dar es Salaam, where he had been receiving treatment. He was 56 years old.

During his life, Mr Masburi served in various positions which include Dar es Salam mayor – from 2010 to 2015 – a member of the East Africa Legislative Assembly (EALA) as well as the Dar es Salaam Regional chairman of CCM youth wing. He had contested the seat of Ubungo, Dar es Salaam, in the 2015 parliamentary election, losing out to Saed Kubenea of Chadema.

President John Magufuli led mourners paying their last respects. He prompted chuckles at the funeral by acknowledging that Masaburi had five wives and more than 20 children, adding that it was not shameful to have many wives and children. “It is normal in African culture to have many wives and children, so I take this opportunity to extend my condolences to all the widows regardless of their legitimacy,” he said.

REVIEWS

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by Martin Walsh

REMEMBERING JULIUS NYERERE IN TANZANIA: HISTORY, MEMORY, LEGACY. Marie-Aude Fouéré (editor). Mkuki na Nyota, Dar es Salaam, 2015. xiv + 337 pp. (paperback). ISBN 978-9987-753-26-0. £25.00. http://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/remembering-julius-nyerere-in-tanzania

I enjoy edited volumes on a particular theme or topic for three reasons: first, they sometimes include excellent work by previously unpublished researchers, edited by scholars with specialised knowledge of the theme or topic; second, they are a useful forum for established authors to account for this emerging scholarship in their own treatments; and third, read together, the bibliographies attached to each essay serve as an excellent cross-referencing tool to guide further research.

This collection is a good example of such a publication, gathering together a good deal of new research from emerging scholars on the topic of remembering Julius Nyerere, Tanzania’s first president. Keen to develop a new perspective on this topic, the contributors’ essays explain their collective determination to break from an enduring scholarly tradition of valorising Nyerere, his political works and his significance in the history of African democracy. As Marie-Aude Fouéré points out, the essays she has edited in this volume focus instead on the production of a usable past for a contemporary (re)imagination of nationhood, in which ‘Nyerere’ becomes a ‘floating signifier’, that is, an unfixed political metaphor that is deployed in different ways in the course of debating and acting upon the present.

Many of the chapters in the book document and discuss this issue as it applies to Nyerere and his works. For example, Emma Hunter’s chapter suggests how the Arusha Declaration and Ujamaa were Nyerere’s way of winning back political power for himself and his party by formalising a pervasive anticapitalist and anti-corruption discourse in post-colonial Tanzania. Despite the failure of Ujamaa as a socioeconomic model for prosperity and equality, the policy allowed Nyerere to cement his reputation as an incorruptible figure of righteousness and social justice and, following his death, allowed others to transform him into a contemporary symbol of a more moral time in the past.

The essays by Kelly Askew, James Brennan and Mary Ann Mhina are all to some degree concerned with what might have been or might still be concealed or occluded by Nyerere’s shadow as it figures in literary, academic and poetic engagements with him in his guise as the hardworking, modest, self-effacing schoolteacher and as the august and preeminent torch-bearer of Tanzanian – and African – political self-determination and independence. After all, we must wonder about the reasoning behind Nyerere’s decision to establish a foundation named for himself that, according to Olivier Provini’s chapter, pays him a permanent tribute by disseminating his political thought through various media and the publication of his speeches.

In her chapter, Mhina points out that our view of discourse – and the signifiers and symbols it deploys – must not neglect the ability people have to perpetrate, penetrate, transcend or ignore it, depending on context and their own particular needs. Fouéré extends this point, explaining that whoever and whatever Nyerere the man might have been during his lifetime, the signifier/symbol called ‘Nyerere’ has become a polyvalent means of both operating upon the past in the present and of deploying the past in operations upon the present. Individual and corporate efforts to claim Nyerere in this fashion are also telling: those who vie for power over Nyerere’s meaning do so in the knowledge that their particular signifier can, through the power of the symbol, become a mirror that reflects the virtues they ascribe to it back upon them. If the signifier/symbol they have created is powerful and widely accepted, they may, by associating or affiliating with their symbol, draw upon its power to legitimate their own authority and projects.

The chapters by Aikande Kwayu and Kristin Phillips, for example, each present research data to explain how political legitimacy is appropriated by those who can present themselves as lineal descendants of whatever politically expedient version of Nyerere they successfully posit, while Provini and Sonia Languille consider how Nyerere’s educational legacy is honoured or ignored in the administraton of contemporary university and secondary education.

The essays in this book all touch on what I see as a particularly Tanzanian syllogism: Nyerere was all that was best about Tanzania in the past, while Tanzania remains all that its greatest son made it. Whether the conclusion of this logical expression is true or not, I expect that this volume is only the beginning of a much deeper study of the symbolic power of Nyerere-as­metonym-for-Tanzania, as well as a more wide-ranging consideration of his significance(s) in East Africa and further afield.
Gavin Macarthur

Gavin Macarthur graduated with a PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of Manchester in 2009. His doctoral research suggests that the islands of Zanzibar are imagined in multiple cultured modes, continuously resituating the Isles in differential historical, geographical and socio-political relations with the Tanzanian mainland and other places around the globe. He is currently developing a health-focused eco-adventure tourism project to implement certain of the UN’s sustainable development goals in Jeju island, South Korea.

A MONUMENT TO CHINA-AFRICA FRIENDSHIP: FIRST-HAND ACCOUNT OF THE BUILDING OF TAZARA. Compiled by the Policy Planning Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, People’s Republic of China. English translation by Chen Feng and Jarrod Williams. World Affairs Press, 2015. 256 pp. (hardback). ISBN 978-7-5012-5084-4. (No price given.)

A detailed report on the planning and construction of the TAZARA railway, from a Chinese perspective, is very welcome. For this was one of the largest and most complex infrastructure project constructed in Africa in the 1970s, and by far the largest turnkey project undertaken abroad by China at that time. As this book, compiled from interviews with the key people involved, shows, it was an eye-opener and learning experience for all involved.

The speed of construction was incredible. The project was discussed by President Nyerere during his visit to China in 1965, only a few months after Ian Smith had declared UDI in Zimbabwe and prevented Zambia exporting its copper by the quickest route to Beira. Construction started in 1970 and was completed in October 1975. 50,000 Chinese and even more Tanzanians and Zambians worked on the project. The challenges were unbelievable. There were no recent engineering studies, no usable maps for parts of the route, the alignment had to be decided, there were problems causes by geology (including the risk of earthquakes, the difficult climb up into the Southern Highlands at Makambako, and the difficulties of construction in swampy land along the Kilombero Valley and elsewhere), sickness and especially malaria, wildlife in and near the Selous Game Reserve (the Tanzanian army arranged for the construction teams to be issued with guns), and the provision of supplies and
materials for such a large project.

This book shows how these challenges were overcome. It will interest students of the relationships between China and countries in Africa, and anyone interested in railways. But because it is based on reminiscences, it is also a fascinating study of relationships, and the meetings of cultures both in some of the most isolated places in the world and in the palaces and offices of world leaders.
Andrew Coulson

Andrew Coulson is the author of Tanzania: A Political Economy (second edition, 2013), and Chairman of the Britain-Tanzania Society.

PAINTED DEVILS AND THE LIVES OF ORDINARY PEOPLE. Tuan Marais. Storyline Studio, Western Cape, South Africa, 2016 (paperback). ISBN 978-6-620-60019-4. R185 (and various prices online) http://www.tuanmarais.co.za/.

This memoir is prefaced by Shakespeare’s ‘tis the eye of childhood / That fears a painted devil’ (Macbeth, Act 2, Scene 2). Memoirs are precious stories, carrying the words of ordinary people living through historically interesting times. Young Tuan Marais went to live in Zanzibar with his mother and her new husband. This was Zanzibar of 1956, when the popular Sultan Seyyid bin Khalifa still ruled a diverse population before the rush to independence had taken hold. Painted Devils is Tuan’s profoundly sensitive story of his childhood and young adulthood.

Tuan became immersed in the island’s exotic life. His halcyon days were spent learning the life of the seas. Local Zanzibaris befriended him and guided him in the traditional ways of fishing and negotiating the coral reefs. Soon he was a natural, weaving fishing traps and speaking Swahili. The family home was next to the Sultan’s Kibweni country palace and one of his memories is of rescuing the Sultan’s yacht during a storm. He recalled seeing the great dhow fleets arriving with the monsoon.

The English culture of Tuan’s family prescribed formal education and religious passage as necessary steps to adulthood. Most colonial children suffered the wrench that was boarding school. It was profoundly formative. It would be interesting to know what reflections those children would later have if, instead, they had been enrolled into local schools. Zanzibar before the Revolution had excellent primary and secondary schools based on the British system of O- and A-levels, and a rich and diverse cultural milieu. Tuan’s parents were not part of the British colonial administration and had no sense of the pull of ‘back home’ that characterised those families regarding their sojourn in Zanzibar as temporary. Tuan became conscious of racism, both in Zanzibar and at his Kenyan boarding school. Racism was taught to him through shame and ridicule. This was also the time that emerging political parties in Zanzibar, and across Africa, were demanding independence – Uhuru! The Cold War intensified this struggle. Tuan was hardly aware of the political wrangling, the escalating violent rhetoric as opposing sides grappled for the popular vote. The presence of Swahili, Shirazi, Manga Arabs, Goans, Indians and mainland Africans was taken as natural by his young self. Meanwhile the British were slipping away, having lost the will to invest in a troubled island. Tuan planned his future in Zanzibar: to offer diving and deep-sea fishing tours from a traditional fishing dhow. This was not to be. The Revolution of 1964 intervened. His parents were attacked on the day of the revolt when the infamous John Okello directed brutal mobs. They were taken to Okello’s headquarters and bound. Around them were the bodies of murdered Arab Zanzibaris. It is likely that they were saved by Okello’s order that no whites were to be killed – for fear of British intervention. Instead Okello whipped up his supporters into a genocide of Zanzibari Arab people. This is the dark history that the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar has never acknowledged.

The last section of the memoir is the story of Tuan’s life in South Africa. He was conscripted into the army and for a brief while groomed to be a South African spy. The Apartheid secret police wanted information on the Frelimo camps supposedly located in Zanzibar. He turned down this offer but did visit Zanzibar in 1966, finding the island miserable under the grip of its own brand of oppression.

In 1997, in his late middle-age, Tuan returned to Zanzibar but his Eden had disappeared and he struggled to find acceptance and resolution. Tuan’s memoir is poetically written, filled with the sense of those magic years when anything seemed possible. His years of youth were in Zanzibar and his depiction of life in the pre-revolutionary Sultanate is a charming tale of self-discovery. And perhaps it is with nostalgia that we might imagine how Zanzibar might have been had it not suffered the violence and despotism of those years.
Anne M. Chappel

Anne M. Chappel was born in Mwanza, Tanganyika, in 1947 and moved to Zanzibar in 1956 when her father worked for the British colonial administration, finally occupying the position of Permanent Secretary to Mohammed Shamte, the Prime Minister for the brief period of Zanzibar’s independence. Anne has written a novel, Zanzibar Uhuru, covering the last 50 plus years of Zanzibar’s history, as well as a biography of her father, Time Past in Africa. Anne lives in Adelaide, Australia.

Also noticed:
MIKIDADI WA MAFIA: MAISHA YA MWANAHARAKATI NA FAMILIA YAKE NCHINI TANZANIA. Pat Caplan. Translated into Swahili by Ahmad Kipacha. Mkuki na Nyota, Dar es Salaam, 2014. xxi + 162 pp. (paperback). ISBN 978-9987-08-295-7. £17.95. http://www.africanbookscollective.com/books/mikidadi-wa-mafia

Anthropologist Pat Caplan’s fascinating account of the life and times of a villager on Mafia and their friendship over nearly four decades from 1965 until his untimely death in 2002. Describing her book as a cross between biographical history and historical biography, the author must be lauded for making it available to a wider readership. The longer and more scholarly English version has now been published under the title Mikidadi: Individual Biography and National History in Tanzania (Sean Kingston Publishing, 2016), and will be reviewed in a future issue of Tanzanian Affairs.

ON CALL IN AFRICA: IN WAR AND PEACE, 1910-1932. Norman Parsons Jewell. Gillyflower Publishing, Hove, 2016. 416 pp., with 145 photographs and 16 line drawings (hardback). ISBN 978-0-9931382-0-1. £35.00.
Described by William Boyd as “An absolutely fascinating memoir of a doctor’s life in Africa and an evocative and wholly authentic account of the East African campaign, 1914-18, a forgotten corner of the Great War”, this book comes highly recommended. It is based in part on Jewell’s personal diary and extensive photographic collection, and covers his wartime experiences in German East Africa as well as his colonial service in the Seychelles and Kenya (some readers will be familiar with his son John’s Dhows at Mombasa, 1969, revised edition 1976). The book’s website provides much more information (see https://oncallinafrica.com/).
MW

DEVELOPMENT RESEARCH

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by Hugh Wenban-Smith
This compilation of articles, culled from journals in the LSE library, covers January to June 2016. The abstracts are based on those published by the author(s), although sometimes shortened a bit.

“Development and progress as historical phenomena in Tanzania – Maendeleo? We had that in the past” Ahearne RM. African Studies Review 59(1).
Academic discussions of development continue to grow, yet critical engagement with communities affected by development interventions remain limited. Drawing from life history interviews conducted in Southern Tanzania, this article details the varied experiences of development interventions among older people and how these affect broader understandings of progress. Many juxtapose their negative views of ujamaa villagisation with more positive recollections of previous interventions (esp. the Groundnut Scheme), which are infused with what is described here as ‘development nostalgia’. Perceptions of the past clearly inform the social, political and economic aspirations of today, with the richness of the constructed narratives adding further nuance to existing depictions of Tanzanian historiography.

“Artisanal frontier mining of gold in Africa: Labour transformation Tanzania and the DRC” Bryceson DF & S Geenen. African Affairs Vol 115(459). This article studies the transformative nature of ‘artisanal frontier mining’ in view of SSA’s mining history. Artisanal gold production has generated livelihood earnings for millions of people in SSA. Yet we must go beyond a study of artisanal mining as an individual livelihood choice and considers the sector’s internal dynamics. In this sense, the concept of ‘labour transformation’ is helpful. It refers to a process in which individuals’ skill acquisition, economic exchange, psychological reorientation, and social positioning evolve towards a shared occupational identity, and collective professional norms, leaving considerable scope for self-governance amongst artisanal miners.

“The scramble for textbooks in Tanzania” Languille S. African Affairs Vol 115(458). In 2014, the Chama cha Mapinduzi (CCM) government in Tanzania decided to discontinue the market-based systems for textbook provision that was established in the early 1990s and revert to full state control. Drawing on the theory of political settlements and the literature on Tanzania’s industrial politics, the article examines the political economy of textbook provision in this country in order to generate new insights into the relations between the educational, political and economic spheres. It shows how donor ideology and practices, while subjecting textbooks to generic market principles, also promoted the interests of western publishing corporations. It then argues that the distribution of power within the state, and the ambiguous relations between the CCM ruling elites, bureaucrats and the capitalist class, prevented the consolidation of a textbook industrial policy geared towards supporting the local publishing industry. Finally, the article explains the elite’s diverse corrupt practices to capture public funding for textbooks at the national and local levels.

“We are not farmers: Dilemmas and prospects of residential suburban cultivators in contemporary Dar es Salaam, Tanzania” Owens GR. Journal of Modern African Studies Vol 54(3).
Today a majority of citizens of Dar es Salaam participate in suburban and ex-urban growth and development much like urbanites throughout the world. Unlike the garden suburbs of North America or Europe, Dar es Salaam’s suburban residents often engage in multiple income-generating activities, the most common and conspicuous of which are cultivation and animal husbandry. The presence of urban farming has suggested that Dar es Salaam’s residents represent peasants incrementally transitioning to urban life. This article however contends that everything from the varieties of cultivation, access to land and work, to the definition of what it means to be a farmer is shaped by decentralised private interests controlling access to land and resources in suburban neighbourhoods. The varieties of cultivation and animal husbandry instead reflect socio-economic class distinctions emerging from a new suburban political economy, enabling a clearer perspective on the prospects of cultivators as these suburban districts transform.

“Turbulent times: Fighting history today in Tanzania’s trophy hunting spaces” Wright VC. Journal of Contemporary African Studies Vol 34(1).
The paper discusses the turbulent times facing trophy hunting in Tanzania. It reviews the industry’s contentious history, and illustrates the ominous politics that are emerging out of the country’s recent neo-liberal schemes, Wildlife Management Areas. Through the decentralisation that accompanies WMAs, the rural communities who co-inhabit trophy hunting spaces are finding new ways to limit, resist and, sometimes, eliminate it.

“The formal divide: Customary rights and the allocation of credit to agriculture in Tanzania” Stein H et al. Journal of Development Studies Vol 52(9).
It is generally held that one mechanism to enable inclusive growth in Tanzania is enabling farmers to access credit to raise productivity and incomes. The formalisation of property rights in Tanzania is being undertaken by a multiplicity of actors at great expense to donors, individuals and the government. While there have been a variety of different justifications for allocating Certificates of Customary Rights of Occupancy (CCROs) to farmers in Tanzania, perhaps the most prominent argument is that it will enable farmers to finally overcome the divide between ‘informal’ customary rights and the banking sector. CCROs would provide the collateral that would induce banks to lend money to small scale farmers. As part of a 6 year investigation in Manyara, Mbeya and Dodoma regions, our research team evaluated the impact of formalisation on farmers’ access to credit. The paper will present the results while pointing to the continuing institutional and market imperfections that perpetuate the formal divide.

“Water availability and reliability in Dar es Salaam” Smiley SL. Journal of Development Studies Vol 52(9).
Dar es Salaam’s water landscape is unjust, inequitable and uneven. Water rationing and electricity outages affect water availability alongside an overall shortfall in water supply. Using household surveys and interviews, this paper shows that a majority of respondents lack a consistently reliable source of water. To cope with poor access, households alter their daily routines, consume less water, and identify and use back-up sources of water. It is crucial to understand the problems of water availability in the city in order to make more informed policy decisions and more justly provide water access.

“Weather shocks, agricultural production and migration: Evidence from Tanzania” Kubik Z & M Maurel. Journal of Development Studies Vol 52(5).
We analyse whether Tanzanian rural households engage in migration as a response to weather-related shocks. We hypothesize that, when exposed to such shocks and a consecutive crop yield reduction, rural households use migration as a risk management strategy. Our findings confirm that for an average household, a 1 per cent reduction in agricultural income induced by weather shock increases the probability of migration by 13 percentage points on average within the year. Hoever the effect is significant only for households in the middle of the wealth distribution, suggesting that the choice of migration as an adaptation strategy depends on initial endowment. What is more, the proposed mechanism applies to households whose income is highly dependent on agriculture, but is not important for diversified livelihoods.

“Food culture and child-feeding practices in Njombe and Mvomero districts, Tanzania” Mwaseba DJB, R Kaarhus & ZS Mvena. Journal of Eastern African Studies Vol 10(2).
This article explores food culture and child-feeding practices, focusing on children below five years, among the Bena and Luguru ethnic groups located in Njombe and Mvomero rural districts in Tanzania. This article is part of a larger research project whose overall purpose was to investigate the outcome of milk-based nutrition interventions involving dairy goat and cattle-keeping with the aim among others to improve health and nutritional status of family members. Methods used included participant observation, in-depth interviews, focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews. Findings show that early pre-lacteal feeds are commonly introduced in both societies and the most common complementary food includes plain maize porridge. On the other hand, milk consumption among children was rather limited. Existing food habits and feeding practices do not always meet the current international recommendations on child feeding. Besides, recommendations and nutritional information on child feeding have largely not been used as suggested and this paper argues that, for the successful introduction and implementation of nutrition-based interventions targeting children, it is important to identify and improve upon the indigenous child-feeding practices, reflecting existing food habits, food-related beliefs, and their meanings.

PRESIDENT MAGUFULI -THE FIRST SIX MONTHS

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by David Brewin

Selection of newspapers from Aug 30th, some referring to the planned Chadema protests on 1st September (images from millardayo.com)

Selection of newspapers from Aug 30th, some referring to the planned Chadema protests on 1st September (images from millardayo.com)

Many commentators have been expressing their views on the perfor­mance of President Magufuli during his first hundred days in office. There is widespread agreement that his crusade against corruption and related evils was overdue and that the President has become a popular personality both inside and outside Tanzania.

There has been no let up in the actions being taken against corruption. According to ‘The Africa Report’, one young lady rebutted the advances of a civil servant by saying, in a political cartoon: “Sorry, I don’t date government guys any longer. There was a time, when dating officials, especially those within the Tanzania Revenue Authority and Tanzania Ports’ Authority, was worth something in the bars of Dar es Salaam….. But since John Magufuli took up the presidency in November things have changed.”

Cuts announced
Drastic cuts were announced in the ‘Estimates of Public Expenditure for Consolidated Fund Services’ in the next financial year. This includes the following:
. the State House budget will drop from TSh 20.6 billion approved for the current financial year to TSh 15.0 billion;
. costs related to rehabilitation and other civil works were slashed from TSh 2.22 billion in the current budget to TSh 372 million;
. expenditure for basic salaries of pensionable posts were decreased from TSh 4.35 billion to TSh 3.51 billion;
. the budget for foreign training dropped from TSh 3.47 million to TSh 1.25 million;
. the budget for routine maintenance of buildings dropped from the TSh 1.46 billion to TSh 800 million;
. the budget for in-country travel will fall from TSh 1.36 billion to TSh 802 million; and
. the recurrent expenditure for the Vice President’s office dropped from TSh 31.5 billion to TSh 9.41 billion.

Moving to Dodoma
After little positive action by the government for the last 40 years the new government has let it be known that it wants to fully move its seat of operations from Dar to Dodoma by 2020. The Prime Minister, Kassim Majaliwa, announced that he would move even sooner, by September 2016, and called on other ministers to do likewise.

Transferring staff
In a move to reduce corruption the government has planned to transfer all immigration officials at both main airports in the country to other posts and also transfer officials of the Passport, Accountancy, Residential Permits and Investigation Units at the Immigration Headquarters.

Live TV broadcasts from Parliament
The action of the new government in stopping the popular live broad­casts of the proceedings in the National Assembly because they were said to be ‘too expensive’ proved controversial.

Zitto Kabwe, leader of the ACT Party, led the opposition and sought sus­pension of business to allow MPs to debate it in Parliament. However, a decision given earlier by the Steering Committee ruled that debate on the President’s speech could not be disrupted.

Chadema MP Tundu Lissu, insisted that this went against the rules of the House by usurping the roles of the Chair and the Committee on Procedures. Amidst much noise and disturbance the riot police arrived and several opposition MPs were frogmarched out of the Chamber. Eventually the leader of the main opposition Chadema Party agreed to let MPs continue the debate on the President’s speech and asked the remaining opposition MPs to leave the chamber.

Widespread protests from the opposition and journalists’ groups con­
tinued. They said that the decision was tantamount to censorship. Opposition parties offered to pay for the service, but their offer was rejected. There seems to be a widespread feeling in the country that broadcasts are a rare outlet where the relatively small but lively opposi­tion can hold the government to account and citizens can get an unvar­nished version of government matters being discussed by MPs.

Instead of a full broadcast of proceedings, the parliament’s press team is now distributing selected highlights to TV stations at the close of each day’s session, according to press accounts.
The BBC reported that, since the live coverage was halted, MPs had
been recording parliamentary debates on their mobile phones and
uploading the footage to social media.

Fine for Magufuli Facebook insult
A 40-year-old man was sentenced to three years in jail or a fine of TSh 7 million ($3,100) after he was found guilty of insulting President Magufuli on his Facebook page. He admitted committing the offence. However, the court reduced the punishment after a plea by the lawyer of the accused. He will be required to pay a penalty of TSh 7 million in two instalments. If he fails to fulfil these requirements, he will serve the jail term.

Removing a Minister
In a two-paragraph press statement in May, the President announced that he had revoked the appointment of Charles Kitwanga MP as Home Affairs Minister for coming to parliament ‘in a state of drunkenness’; he then arranged a minor cabinet reshuffle.

Job freeze
The President said in June that the government had decided to tempo­rally freeze new employment opportunities in the public service, and to stop salary increments in a move to stamp out ‘phantom workers’ on the government’s payroll. He advised those aspiring for jobs in the next financial year to wait for at least two months so that the government could ‘end contradictions’ as it was struggling to clear out non-existent ‘ghost workers’ while the public service continued to recruit new staff. All permits for sabbatical leave were also stopped.

Cutting Top salaries
President Magufuli declared that no executive in the public service should receive a monthly salary exceeding TSh 15 million beginning in the next financial year. He said it was a shame for a poor country like Tanzania to have people in public institutions getting TSh 40 million while those in junior positions received only TSh 300,000 a month.

7,800 students suspended
In the kind of move introduced by the Father of the Nation Julius Nyerere shortly after Independence in 1962, 7,800 University of Dodoma students have been suspended. They were studying under a special education programme and only those with the requisite quali­fications are being recalled to resume their studies. The President said that some high officials had taken advantage of the special programme to enrol their relatives [see also Education section]

The Opposition
The Chadema Party has appointed a new Secretary General – Dr Vincent Mashinji (43). In his first address he said that he wanted to mobilise the members to fight for a new party constitution. He said he had chosen to abandon medicine and venture into active politics. He would aim for the party to ‘occupy the State House by 2020’.

Chadema also announced their intention to hold a “day of defiance” with a series of nationwide protests on September 1st, 2016, denouncing what they described as President Magufuli’s “dictatorial” attitude to the opposition, notably a ban on politicians holding public rallies.

The police have banned the demonstrations, on the grounds of national security and protecting the peace. However, Chadema leaders insisted that they intend to go ahead regardless, noting that the ban on the pro­tests was further evidence of the government’s heavy-handed restric­tions on opposition party activities, freedom of assembly and freedom of speech. Other complaints relate to the arrest of some opposition politicians and journalists for “sedition”, the closure or suspension of several media outlets, and clampdowns on online freedoms.

STOP PRESS: Amid rising tensions, Chadema leaders postponed the Sept 1st protest hours before it was due to start, partly in response to offers from religious leaders including the Revd Anthony Lusekelo to mediate the crisis.

FOREIGN RELATIONS

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by David Brewin

Anti-corruption Summit

Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa (fourth right) with Prime Minister Cameron at Lancaster House May 2016 (Photo: Prime Minister’s Office)

Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa (fourth right) with Prime Minister Cameron at Lancaster House May 2016 (Photo: Prime Minister’s Office)

Prime Minister David Cameron hosted a landmark international Anti-Corruption Summit in London in July which was attended by repre­sentatives from 40 countries. The UK Government had applauded the strong anti-corruption drive by the Tanzanian government and invited President Magufuli to participate. However, he had a prior engagement in Kampala at the inauguration of Ugandan President Museveni for another term in office. He sent a strong delegation to London led by Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa. Apparently only one other African country was invited to the summit: Nigeria.

The meeting agreed the first ever ‘Global Declaration Against Corruption’, and those present committed themselves to work together to expose, punish and drive it out. The Summit Communiqué stated that “no country is immune from corruption and governments needed to work together, and with partners from business and civil society to tackle it successfully”. The Communiqué included concrete actions aimed at exposing corruption; punishing the corrupt; supporting those who have suffered and driving it out. In addition to the Communiqué, countries made specific commitments in their country statements.

A new partnership between Tanzania and the UK’s National Crime Agency was launched to share expertise in audit, financial regulation and anti-corruption investigation. The UK Crown Prosecution Service agreed to assist in establishing Tanzania’s Special Anti-Corruption Division of the High Court. The UK Department for International Development agreed to support Tanzania’s institutions of accountabil­ity, including the PCCB and the National Audit Office.

Rwanda and Tanzania

PHOTO President Magufuli greets Rwandan President Paul Kagame as he arrives in Dar-es-Salaam on his maiden state visit (Photo: State House)

PHOTO President Magufuli greets Rwandan President Paul Kagame as he arrives in Dar-es-Salaam on his maiden state visit (Photo: State House)

The visit by President Magufuli in May to Rwanda attracted large friendly crowds. At the same time a first ‘Tanzania-Rwanda Trade Forum’ was held in Kigali. It lasted for a week and has apparently sweetened relations between the two countries. It also gave Rwandan President Paul Kagame the chance to call on Tanzania to do something about the theft of Rwandan minerals being exported via Tanzania to the outside world. Dar es Salaam remains the main port for land-locked Rwanda, handling 70% of the country’s imports and over 90% of its exports.

Tanzania has installed cameras and boosted security at the port. Rwandan traders who were not allowed access to the container station now have complete access. Rwandan minerals are stored in a special parking zone and transporters are also allowed access to the yards where the containers are held. Minerals are escorted by armed security personnel from the time they arrive to the time they leave the port.

Human trafficking
According to a spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and East African Co-operation, the recent action amongst East African states to stop human trafficking of young women between 18 and 24 years old, who are seeking work in the Far East and Middle East, is not working properly.

After imposing restrictions on Tanzanian jobseekers at all Tanzanian International Airports, a syndicate of human traffickers began arrang­ing flights of young girls through Kenyan and Ugandan airports.

Between March and May, Tanzanian embassies in India, Malaysia and Oman made efforts to repatriate girls who had been forced to work in brothels.

In Britain, newly appointed Prime Minister Theresa May indicated that she wanted to give top priority to stopping human trafficking world­wide.

BREXIT
The result of Britain’s decision to leave the European Union caused sur­prise and some consternation in Tanzania. Bank of Tanzania’s Governor Benno Ndulu said that Brexit was likely to affect markets but it was a bit early to say and they were following developments very closely.

ZANZIBAR

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by David Brewin

After the independence of Zanzibar in 1964 and the subsequent violent revolution, a pattern was established under which the Zanzibar government was re-elected every five years. There were only two significant parties – the ruling CCM or ‘revolutionary party’ which was the majority party in the main and larger Unguja island and the only significant opposition party – the Civic United Front (CUF) which always won a few seats in the House of Representatives in Unguja but had overwhelming support in the other smaller island of Pemba.

Zanzibaris tend to take elections very seriously and the atmosphere during elections is usually intense. In each election a few incidents of violence were witnessed. The CCM won each time, usually with a very small majority and always with complaints from CUF that the CCM had rigged the elections.

After the elections of 2010, the two parties finally came together in a ‘Government of National Unity’ which reduced much of the interparty animosity.

However, during the largely peaceful 2015 elections, the Zanzibar Electoral Commission (ZEC) suddenly stopped the counting of votes saying that there had been irregularities, especially in Pemba. Both sides claimed to have won [see TA 113 and 114].

The CCM then said that there would be another election on March 20th 2016. CUF decided to boycott this and were joined by a group of very small parties. CUF wanted the results of the previous (2015) election to be accepted.

In the second election the number of people voting was only about 15% of the electorate and CCM got an unprecedented 91% of the vote. Nine out of 14 small parties joined CUF’s boycott. Another new feature was that three smaller, previously hardly known parties, won seats and subsequently supported the CCM in the Zanzibar House of Representatives, enabling it to claim an element of legitimacy for a continuation of its rule.

CUF’s difficult position
CUF is now in a very difficult position as it has no MPs in the House of Representatives and the population of Zanzibar is only about 1.5 million compared with the massive 45 million on the mainland supported by a substantial army.­

The CUF delegation with Seif Sharrif Hamad (second left) and Ismail Jussa (third left) arriving at Dules airport Washington DC on June 11.

The CUF delegation with Seif Sharrif Hamad (second left) and Ismail Jussa (third left) arriving at Dules airport Washington DC on June 11.

CUF is taking various actions to help it to survive; It is trying to launch a campaign of civil disobedience and has produced a report titled: “Human Rights Violations by Security Organs against the Opposition in Zanzibar 2015-2016.”

It said that it was going to file a case at the High Court against the Inspector General of Police and the Minister for Home Affairs for what it termed as ‘atrocities committed by police and other security organs against its supporters during the election’. Taking journalists through the report, CUF’s Acting Director for Human Rights, Ms Pavu Juma Abdallah, said that more than a thousand people had been directly affected by the ‘atrocities’ which she said had been committed during the election campaign. She added that it had all started on March 24 last year, when a CUF office in Dimani was torched. Five days later a militia attacked CUF supporters on their way from a rally in Makunduchi. A number of CUF supporters were said to have fallen victim to a wave of attacks including from uniformed police officers and other security operatives, which left six people with gunshot wounds. According to her, the data that CUF collected from the ground indicated that 300 people had been arrested by security officials. Some hundreds were said to have been beaten, 70 houses belonging to CUF supporters were destroyed. CUF said that it would use these figures to speed up the pro­cesses of helping The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) to open investigations against “all those who perpetuated the atroci­ties.” CUF intends to send evidence to President Magufuli, and all local and international human rights organisations to give them a first-hand account of the alleged abuses.

In July-August, there was a visit by a CUF delegation, led by Secretary General Seif Sharrif Hamad, to the USA, Canada, Britain and other European countries to explain the dangers which might lie ahead. He repeatedly warned of unrest in the isles if the present situation contin­ued; Radicals would find an opening in Zanzibar, an archipelago with a 98% Muslim population.

Zitto Kabwe, MP for Kigoma and the leader of the small opposition ACT-Wazalendo Party, told The African Report that Zanzibar was “boiling”. There was is no legitimate government in Zanzibar and “I am worried that people will go to the streets”.

Many political analysts said that leaving CUF, which had been a pow­erful opposition force in the past 20 years, out of politics, could have serious repercussions on democracy and peace.

A statement issued by 16 high commissioners and ambassadors to Tanzania, condemned the ZEC decision to annul the Zanzibar election.

European Union reactions
The European Union clearly had some difficulty in reacting to the Zanzibar election results. Eventually it decided to maintain minimal contact with the government of Zanzibar’s President Ali Mohammed Shein because of the decision of the ZEC to annul the election results without providing evidence to justify “this unprecedented decision”.

The second election was boycotted by 9 out of 14 political parties, which had participated in the November 2015 poll.

Nape Nnauye, the ruling CCM party’s Publicity and Ideology Secretary, said that his party would go to the second polls regardless of any boy­cotting because ‘not all political parties have been fielding candidates in every election’.

CONSTITUTION

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by Enos Bukuku

The implementation of a new Tanzanian constitution has been left in limbo since April 2015 when the draft constitution was supposed to be put to a national referendum.

We now have some news which suggests that there is still a possibility that Tanzania will have a new constitution. President Magufuli announced on 23rd June that the government would ensure that the constitution making process would continue where it left off and that the final draft “Katiba” would be presented to the nation in the refer­endum.

This move has surprised many observers, who thought that the govern­ment had given up on passing the largely controversial and divisive draft. There had been suggestions that the government would go back and arrange for a further redraft of the constitution which would look more like the previous draft created by the Warioba-led Constitution Review Commission (CRC).

There has been no date given for the referendum and so it is not yet certain that it will take place this year, if at all. However, the longer the process takes, the more criticism and opposition the current draft constitution will face. This in turn will make it less likely that it will be voted for.

Already Joseph Warioba has warned the government that its attempts to stamp out corruption would be difficult without a supportive constitu­tion, and that some sections of the previous draft, now removed, con­tained provisions which could be used in Magufuli’s war on corruption.

Regarding democracy, veteran political journalist Jenerali Ulimwengu has been more outspoken and is quoted as saying, “Despite the actions that President Magufuli is taking and has been commended for, if you look at the bigger picture we have now gone back 50 years in democracy issues…..He (Kikwete) should come and explain ….if former ministers were taken to court for causing a loss to the government, Honourable Jakaya Kikwete should also be taken to court to answer charges for occasioning a huge loss to the government and destroying the hopes of citizens…by failure to get a new constitution”.

It is only a matter of time before Chadema and other opposition parties start attacking the government on constitutional matters.

Magufuli is between a rock and a hard place. The current draft constitu­tion has cost over TSh 116 billion (around $50 million) and counting. To go back and make further amendment will only add to the huge cost and will not guarantee a new agreed draft. To do nothing would be to waste the money spent so far. To push ahead with the current draft will antagonise the opposition. It is well known that the President does not like to waste money. We therefore wait for news of a referendum.

AGRICULTURE

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by David Brewin

Sisal revival
Fifty years ago Tanzania was the biggest producer of sisal in the world – some 300,000 tons per annum. Much of the landscape in Tanga Region and parts of the then Central Region was dominated by huge estates, often owned by private individuals or companies, under the manage­ment of Asians, Greeks and other Europeans. Most of the very hard work on the estates was done by thousands of contract labourers from Rwanda and Burundi.

Sisal is a species of agave native to southern Mexico but widely culti­vated in many other countries. It yields a stiff fibre used in making rope and twine, and now has many other uses including paper, cloth, wall coverings, carpets, and dartboards.

The industry largely collapsed in the fifties when Tanzania’s socialist government nationalised virtually all but one of the estates (Amani), there was a rapid expansion in the use of combine harvesters interna­tionally (sisal twine was no longer needed) and artificial substitutes began to be manufactured at lower cost. The Greeks returned home.

Then, in this century, the industry began to revive slowly as demand increased and new uses were found for the fibre. The government has now set new production targets and planting has started again. Yunus Mssika, Senior Quality Assurance Officer at the Tanzania Sisal Board (TSB) announced recently that the country planned to increase production to reach 100,000 metric tons by 2021.

All this is part of a 10-year Sisal Crop Development Plan started in 2012 aimed at increasing production of various sisal products, to increase uti­lisation of the sisal plant, to increase the country’s export market share, to undertake research and development of products and markets and to increase the participation of smallholder and out-grower farmers in the industry. The plan envisages putting in place biogas plants that will produce fuel for electricity generation on 14 estates.

According to the latest available statistics from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), in 2013, global production of sisal reached 281,000 tons – 53% were produced by Brazil, 12% by Tanzania, 9% Kenya, 6% Madagascar and 5% by China. Currently a ton of sisal trades between $1,900 and $2,200. Prices have stabilized since 2010, fol­lowing increased investments in the crop in Tanzania.

Sugar take-over by Magufuli
Following a major upheaval in the sugar market during recent months and evidence of many questionable practices, the existing private sec­tor sale monopoly (controlled by a small group of people known as the ‘sugar barons’), President Magufuli’s government has taken over control of all sugar imports into the country – mostly from Thailand, Brazil, India and Indonesia. The result was, inevitably, a rise in prices, and serious shortages soon developed.

The President has also launched a major enquiry into the industry, espe­cially into patterns of consumption and the extent of illegal smuggling to avoid tax. The Tanzania Sugar Board quickly arranged for the importation of 12,000 tonnes of sugar to relieve the shortages.

It seems the basic problem is that Tanzania is not producing enough sugar to satisfy local demand. This stands at 420,000 tonnes per year while local production was only 304,000 tonnes in 2015.

In a further development Minister for Agriculture, Mwigulu Nchemba, announced that the government had set aside 294,000 hectares to be allocated to companies looking to develop sugarcane plantations. The Minister said that the land would be allocated to investors through a tendering process, to be coordinated by the Tanzania Investment Centre.

In the light of this, Oman’s Minister for Industry and Trade visited Tanzania recently to lobby for his country to be given permission to invest in the establishment of new sugar estates and put aside a sum of up to $25 million as capital.

Live Animal Exports
In late May the government banned the export of wild animals outside the country for the next three years, until proper procedures can be put in place to ensure that only approved animals are transported.

Rise in Water Level of Lake Victoria
Following a long period of destruction of forests and poor agricultural practices exacerbated by recent heavy rains, the level of water in Lake Victoria is reported to have risen by a metre.

Over-fishing and oxygen depletion are said to be threatening its biodiversity with more than 200 indigenous species facing possible extinction. The members of the Lake Victoria Basin Commission, at a recent meeting in Entebbe, Uganda, studied ways in which these trends could be reversed.

Repossessing Idle Land
The country is in the process of conducting a nationwide audit to identify undeveloped parcels of land exceeding 50 acres with the aim of repossessing them. Minister for Lands, Housing and Human Settlements, William Lukuvi, said recently that ownership of idle land would be revoked and the land reallocated as part of wider efforts to end long-standing land disputes and ensure equitable distribution.

Ban on Shisha smoking
In early July Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa announced a ban on ‘shisha smoking’ in the country and asked clerics, parents and leaders to fight against dealers and smokers. All places that sell shisha were to be closed. ‘Shisha’ is a molasses-based tobacco concoction smoked in a water pipe known as a ‘hookah’. The directive was issued at the Khoja Shia Ithnasheri Mosque in Gandhi Street in Dar es Salaam. He said that shisha was killing the future of the country by wreaking havoc on the mental health of young people. The smoking habit has been gaining popularity among the youth with many believing that it is less harmful than cigarettes. Research conducted by the World Health Organisation (WHO) however, estimates that the volume of smoke inhaled during an hour long session is equivalent to smoking between 100 and 200 cigarettes.