NEWSPAPERS AND CENSORSHIP

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(Extracts from the forthcoming ‘Article 19 International Centre on Censorship’ World Report for 1990 on Freedom of Expression)

HISTORY
When Tanzania gained independence in 1961 the media was controlled by private interests. The country’s leading newspaper and only dally, the ‘Tanganyika Standard’ W8S owned by the London-based Lonrho Company.

Dr Julius Nyerere laid the foundations of Tanganyika’s first important African press. In the mid 1950’s he produced ‘Sauti ya Tanu’ , a duplicated newsletter in a mixture of English and Swahili which was later renamed ‘Mwaafrika’. On several occasions the paper clashed with the British colonial authorities, leading, in 1985, to the jailing of its editors. Dr Nyerere, as the de facto editor, was fined for a libel against the British Governor.

In 1961 TANU launched a pre-independence daily – ‘Uhuru’ meaning Freedom. In April 1964 the Party launched its first English language newspaper ‘The Nationalist’.

After the Arusha Declaration many firms were nationalised and the axe finally fell on the independent press in 1969. The ‘Tanganyika Standard’ was renamed the ‘Standard Tanzania’ but its Sunday partner continued under the title ‘Sunday News’, a title it has retained to this day.

President Nyerere maintained that he did not wish the Standard to be a government mouthpiece but expected it to give general support to government policy. In practice however, the then editor, Frene Ginwalla, often consulted the President or his office for direction on stories, particularly those pertaining to major political decisions and the Liberation struggle. But, despite directives from State House, Miss Ginwalla also proved that she had a mind of her own. During the crisis which brought Field Marshall Idi Amin to power in Uganda, Ginwalla printed stories without Presidential guidance. Not eyen President Nyerere himself was free from criticism. When the President turned to Barclays Bank for funding a project in East Africa, Miss Ginwalla stated that the wrong partner had been picked because Barclays was funding a massive dam project in the Portuguese colony of Mozambique. While President Nyerere, as Editor In Chief, took the criticism in good spirit, it is said that this was the last time the Tanzanian Head of State was criticised in the columns of his country’s media. Miss Ginwalla was later replaced.

CURRENT NEWSPAPERS
The ‘Dally News’ (circulation 50,000) is currently the one daily English language newspaper; it is supported by government subsidies. The ‘Sunday News’ has a circulation of 50,000, the Swahili ‘Uhuru’ 100,000 and its weekend edition, ‘Mzalendo’ 115,000.

Most other publications are produced either by the Ministry of Information or by organisations which have government support. Among the periodicals are ‘Foreign Trade News Bulletin’, ‘Gazette of the United Republic of Tanzania’, ‘Jenga’, ‘Mbioni’, ‘Mfanyakazi’, ‘Mlezi’, ‘Mwenge’, ‘Nchi Yetu’ and ‘Ukulima wa Kisasa’.

There are three well-organised private Christian publishing houses which publish Swahili periodicals. These include the fortnightly ‘Kiongozi’ (circulatlon 103,000) owned by the Roman Catholic Church, the quarterly ‘Sikiliza’ (100,000), published by the Seventh Day Adventist Church and the quarterly ‘Uhuru na Amani’ (10,000) published by the Evangelical Lutheran Church.

CENSORSHIP AND THE FIGHT AGAINST CORRUPTION
Generally Tanzania has a good reputation when it comes to the treatment of its media personnel. There is no government censorship nor open intervention in the dissemination of news. But editors avoid publishing sensitive items which might embarrass the authorities particularly on major issues affecting the ruling Party. The training of Tanzanian journalists at Kivukoni College includes heavy emphasis on political orientation.

Journalists have been instrumental in the exposure of corruption. It was press reports on the General Agricultural Export Corporation which ultimately led to the trial of its top executives and a journalist on ‘Uhuru’ uncovered a massive theft of foreign exchange from the National Bank of Commerce. The reporter received Shs 5,000 reward. But the biggest accolade and Shs 20,000 was reserved for SHIHATA reporter Augustine Mbunda who singlehandedly pursued a story in which a Member of Parliament was found in illegal possession of 105 elephant tusks.

Until 1987 the English language ‘Sunday News’ had no competitor but the tables were turned when a local publisher Dr Anicet G. Leopold launched an independent weekly, the ‘African Baraza’. But the newspaper hit trouble with its first issue. Seasoned journalists said that one story had made critical comparisons between the governments of the first and second Presidents of Tanzania and police impounded all the copies of this one and only issue.

In 1988, however, another weekly English language newspaper the ‘Business Times’ was launched. This broke new ground. It is bold enough to criticise government policy and carry scoops that have eluded the existing newspapers.

FOREIGN CORRESPONDENTS
Tanzania has few foreign correspondents. Most prefer to cover Tanzania from Nairobi. There was an outcry among foreign journalists when what amounts to compulsory licensing of all journalists was introduced. Foreign Journalists have to pay a prohibitively high price for press cards – 5hs 40,000 in hard currency. Local Journalists pay Shs 5,000.

Seven foreign news agencies have bureaux or representatives. They include the Soviet Agentsvo Pachati Novosti, TASS, the Inter-Press Service of Italy, Reuters and Newslink Africa of Britain, Xlnhua of China, Prensa Latina of Cuba and the Associated Press of the United States.

(Tanzania now has another English language newspaper, ‘Family Mirror’, a fortnightly, which is proving increasingly bold. It has been attacked by the Minister of Information as having displayed ‘enormous lack of professionalism.’ and as having abused democracy and to be lacking in objectivity’ – all of which it strongly contested. In a May 1990 issue it investigated (with names) corruption in land allocation; in June it published on its front page an ‘Open Letter’ to President Mwinyi in which it wrote of ‘the growing signs of d1scontent in our society’; in July 1990 it quoted from a BBC World Service broadcast in which Mr Oscar Kambona, the former Tanzanian Foreign Minister had spoken about the setting up of a ‘Tanzania Democratic Forum’ which was urging the immediate repeal of clauses 3 and 77 from Tanzania’s Constitution so as to 1egalise the emergence of parties other than the CCM. In the same issue it referred to ‘serious maladministration and an almost total apathy in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs In Dar es Salaam’ – Editor)

CONSERVATION, DEVELOPMENT AND TOURISM AT SWAHILI RUINS

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Sketch of monument by Alex Vines

Olduvai Gorge, Kilimanjaro, Ngorongoro and Serengeti are not the only splendid assets that Tanzania offers the tourist. Along the hundreds of miles of Tanzanian coast lie numerous ‘Swahili’ ruins dating from what in Europe would be called the ‘Middle Ages’. Some are well-known, though infrequently visited, such as the sites with resident curators administered by the National Museums of Tanzania at Kilwa Kisiwani, Songo Mnara, Kunduchi and Kaole. Many others are however neglected and are seldom visited except by the local inhabitants.

Our knowledge of these ruins derives largely from the pioneer work in the 1950’s and 1960’s of the archaeologists Neville Chittick and Peter Garlake. Their fieldwork and reports provide the basic archive from which all subsequent study and survey commences. In conjunction with the Department of Antiquities these sites were revisited in 1967 to assess their current state of preservation and to make an up to date photographic record of what remained. These brief visits to the Mosques and other coral-built structures on the coast from Kilwa up to Tanga provided confirmation of what everyone feared – that many of the sites had deteriorated seriously in the twenty years since Chittick’s and Garlake’s assessments. This of course is not at all surprising given Tanzania’s poverty. Health and education must clearly take priority over crumbling ruins. But within these constraints Tanzania could still capitalise on her heritage of ruins.

Different dangers face different monuments. Simple neglect was the most common threat to the sites in isolated locations. Foliage and bush were slowly breaking up the fabric of walls through their iron grip. This was however the least serious threat, although affecting some 70% of the sites visited. The simple and not too costly answer would be occasional modest clearance of particularly threatening undergrowth, but this creates its own problems. Many of the neglected Mosque sites are shrines to local ancestors, littered with carefully placed offerings of cloth, rose water or money. Disturbing such monuments would breach the sanctity they continue to enjoy. It can therefore be argued that their secondary religious nature should be respected as much as if they were complete and functioning Mosques, accepting that the local people are happy to tolerate the undergrowth as an integral part of their ancestor’s shrine.

‘ROBBER TRENCHES’
A second threat noted at 10% of the sites visited along the coast was robbery. The situation at Kisiju was especially worrying. The local population had taken to robbing the sites in the area for building materials. This has meant that in many places ‘robber trenches’ remain as the only witness of where walls once stood. Kisiju is a problem because of the ‘Ujamaa’ settlement there which means that many of the local population are originally from other provinces of Tanzania. They therefore feel little affinity with the ancestors of the ruins. The visiting team was told by one incredulous local that it was the first visiting team to ever show interest in the ruins.

THE OIL AND GAS INDUSTRIES
Although Tanzania continues to suffer from acute poverty and a lack of development, where economic development has taken place or is proposed could have lasting consequences for the ruins. Construction related to the oil and gas industry on the island of Sobngo Songo has severely damaged the island’s ruins. It is a reminder both of the potential threat to Tanzania’s heritage and of the need for archaeological consultancy if the plans to develop the Kilwa archipeligo by the petro-chemical industry go ahead.

There is no reason why development and conservation could not go hand in hand. In Botswana legislation stipulates that all development projects need to be first assessed for their potential environmental damage. Companies are obliged, as part of this process, to obtain planning permission and therefore to consult an archaeologist. In Tanzania both the Archaeology Unit at the University and the Antiquities Department have the expertise to carry out such work.

THE GROWTH OF FUNDAMENTALISM
One further threat is unique to the standing and still functioning Mosques. With the growth of fundamentalist Islam and the tensions and competition between Sunni and Shi’ite traditions stimulated by the Iranian, Omani and Saudi Arabian funds flowing into Tanzania to support their particular brand of Islam, historical Mosque edifices are beginning to be modified by renovation or alteration reflecting the form of Islam practised by the different congregations. For the architectural historian this is particularly worrying. Initiatives by more fundamentalist and puritanical sects have begun to cover over and, at times, destroy decorated Kiblas. These could, if they offend be whitewashed or covered over which would preserve them for future scholars. There is no reason why they, should be destroyed. They are a valuable part of East African and, indeed, world history, proving visible evidence of the past great trade routes of the world. We have only to think of the loss to British culture and research from the depredations of Middle Age art in British churches by the Puritans to assess for ourselves the potential loss to Tanzania’s awareness of her past and of her tourist resources.

THE LACK OF MARKETING
One of the striking features about the Tanzanian mainland and its monuments, in contrast to Zanzibar or Kenya, is the lack of marketing, publicity and care. Kenya makes much of Gedi, near Malindi and Fort Jesus in Mombasa as tour destinations. Tanzania may not wish for cheap mass tourists but it is experienced in conducting specialist game tours. Research such as that described by Mark Horton in this Bulletin (No 35) is an important first step in awakening a wider audience to this aspect of Tanzania’s cultural heritage. The next stage should be feasibility studies of ruins as a potential tourist attraction. This has been done already 1n Zanzibar where the international project to rehabilitate the Stone Town is in part a response to such groundwork.

Perhaps the mainland could learn from Zanzibar whose ‘National Museums and Monuments’ is about to launch a Development Plan for ruins and monuments. As UNESCO World Heritage Monuments, the ruins In Kilwa archipelogo could certainly attract specialist tours which could provide badly needed foreign exchange. It is a shame that the existing lack of coordination between those with the relevant expertise in Tanzania in National Museums, Antiquities and the Archaeology Unit to bring about such a plan will mean that Kenya and Zimbabwe will market and continue to prosper in an area that Tanzania could equal or surpass.
Alex Vines

Mr ALEX VINES has held the graduate scholarship at the British Institute in Eastern Africa. He is currently a part-time tutor for African Archaeology and History for the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA).

MISCELLANY

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MALARIA PARASITES RESIST CHLOROQUINE
Malaria continues to be the leading killer disease in Tanzania and chloroquine is becoming increasingly less effective as a cure. Between the late 1960’s and early 1980’s the effective dose of the drug for semi-immune pat tents rose from a single dose of 10 milligrammes per kilo of body weight to 25 milligrammes spread over three days. In Zanzibar even this higher dose can no longer be relied upon – Daily News

DIRECT EXPORT OF CROPS
Prime Minister Joseph Warioba has announced that farmers are now free to export some non-traditional crops directly. The country’s traditional export crops are cotton. coffee, tea, tobacco, sisal, cashewnuts and pyrethrum which are exported through marketing boards. The crops which can now be exported directly include pigeon peas, green mong. yellow gram, groundnuts, simsim, fruits, flowers and spices.

SAMAHANI ….
Reader Mr W. Wenban-Smith has pointed out an error on page 31 of Bulletin No 36. We have now checked with the International Coffee Organisation which states that coffee production in Tanzania in the 1990 -91 season was 928,000 60 kilo bags equivalent to 55,702 tons. In 1989-90 production totalled 858,000 bags. We have not been able to obtain the earlier figures – Editor.

TANZANIA IN THE MEDIA

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FIVE NEW WORLD BANK (IDA) PROJECTS
Tanzania has been receiving a record amount of attention in WORLD BANK NEWS in recent months as it has acquired a number of new IDA credits.

‘Tanzania Modernises Dar es Salaam Port’ (March 1990)- US$ 37.0 million designed to double the capacity of the port’s container terminal and improve other port services.

‘Tanzania Tackles Problems of Malnutrition. Ineffective Health Services’ (March 8) – a US$ 70.0 million project.

‘Tanzania Set to Revitalise Agricultural Sector’ (April 5) – an IDA Credit of US$ 200.0 million in which the emphasis is on reducing the Government’s role in marketing while encouraging cooperatives and the private sector.

‘Tanzania Rehabilitates Road Network’ (June 7) – a US$ 871.0 million project aimed at restoring 60% of the nation’s primary roads and 50% of the regional road network in 11 agriculturally productive regions.

ON THE BRINK OF COLLAPSE
In its item on a new Education Project (US$ 38.0 million credit) WORLD BANK NEWS described Tanzania’s Education sector as having deteriorated from ‘what was once an exemplar system to one that is now on the brink of collapse’. The article went on to state that primary school enrolment had dropped from 96% of all eligible children in 1979 to 78% in 1978. Secondary school enrolment was amongst the lowest in the world, with only 37% of pupils between the ages of 14 and 17 attending school. School buildings were dilapidated and there was no system in place to maintain them. The project includes construction and renovation of schools, more appropriate curricula and improvements in management of the system.

Roger Carter comments on the criticisms of the system as follows: Editor:
‘In 1974 the CCM Party resolved, in what came to be known as the Musoma Resolution, that by November 1977 every child of school age would receive an opportunity of enrollment in Std 1 of a primary school. As a result Std 1 enrolment grew from 433,000 in 1974 to 878,000 in 1977.

This figure included, not only children in the seven year age group, but also many older children who had missed an earlier chance of primary schooling. The subsequent percentage decline and reported deterioration in standards were largely caused by financial stringency. The original Party decision on Universal Primary Education (UPE) had been taken on the basis of a cost calculation made in 1969 and it is doubtful whether Tanzania could have withstood the burden of UPE, even in favourable circumstances, without a serious decline in standards.

In the case of secondary education the number of schools in the public sector remained almost constant from 84 in 1977 to 86 in 1985, reflecting in part the priority given to primary education. One consequence was the blossoming of the private sector. By 1988 the number enrolled in the private sector was 38% greater than in the public sector. Inevitably the standards in private schools in most cases were very poor owing to 1ack of resources and teaching skills’.

A TERRIBLE CONDITION
Under this heading AFRICAN CONCORD in its June 18th issue wrote that Tanzania’s President had kicked against a suggestion by Western nations to make the adoption of multi-partyism a condition for economic aid. President Mwinyi had told the Vice-President of the European Community Manuel Marin that this amounted to both political and economic blackmail of the poor. It is not proper for external powers to force their political standards on others.

TANZANIAN SCIENTISTS GENERATE ‘BIOFUEL’
Microbiologists at the University of Dar es Salaam have discovered a new way of converting organic matter into fuel according to USPG NETWORK, the journal of the United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel’.

The breakthrough came when they discovered how two micro–organisms affect each other in the mouth of the cockroach, which is famous for eating anything. As fossil fuel reserves decline they leave biomass as the most important potential resource for producing renewable energy. Until now the process – which involves the breakdown of cellulose – has been too slow for practical use. Now, thanks to Tanzanian scientists and the humble cockroach, natural systems may be developed which will speed up the process and give the world an alternative source of energy.

HOMAGE TO BLACK STARS
What entertainer hasn’t dreamed of seeing his or her name in lights asked TIME magazine in an article in its June 4th issue. It then went on to describe and illustrate in colour how Tanzania is now offering the ‘stellar names of the black entertainment world’ something different – their faces on postage stamps. Those featured included Makossa saxophonist Manu Dibango from Cameroon, comic actor Eddie Murphy and Singer-songwriter Stevie Wonder from the USA, South African singer Miriam Makeba and the late Sammy Davis Jr.

GFTTING TO ZANZIBAR ISN’T ANY FUN
The WALL STREET JOURNAL stated in a lengthy and highly critical
article in its June 18th issue that Bob Hope, Bing Crosby and the Hollywood movie to the contrary, there is no ‘Road to Zanzibar’.

Stating that the latest brochure on Zanzibar from the tourist office in Dar was printed in 1963 and speaks of up to four flights daily and several passenger ferries, the article went on to describe how the ‘Virgin Butterfly’ (Bulletin No 33) which had plied the seas in airc-onditioned style had had to be towed to Mombassa for repairs and had then ‘just disappeared back to Scandinavia’ from which it came. Next had come the ‘Dolphin’, a fresh-water ferry from the USA which had been made seaworthy for sea water. For several weeks it had chugged from mainland to island in about three hours until it had hit a reef about six miles off Zanzibar and still awaited repair.

‘For the truly desperate traveller there are the Arab trading dhows ….. if tile wind isn’t right to lighten the load the traders will first throw the tourist’s luggage overboard and then, if need be, the tourists themselves. “It happens” says a travel agent for the Tanzania Tourist Corporation. “Why not just fly?”

But, went on the article, ‘its not for nothing that the locals call the Air Tanzania Corporation “Any Time Cancelled”……

After some very unflattering remarks about the Bwawani Hotel – ‘a concrete monstrosity painted a garish yellow’ – and reference to a Zanzibar dissident in Dar es Salaam who had said that the authorities didn’t _want foreigners because the Zanzibari’s would inform them about ‘the situation’ the Zanzibar Chief Minister, Dr Omar Juma, was quoted as having hoped that a privately run airport, a private air service and with Stone Town in the hands of private owners who would fix up the
houses, Zanzibar’s tourist industry could be saved.

HISTORIC PLACES AND ELECTRIC FACTORIES
The thirteenth issue of the JAPAN – TANZANIA ASSOCIATION NEWS of June 13th reported on the State Visit of Tanzania’s President to Japan from December 17th to 22nd 1989. The President had attended welcoming ceremonies at the Akasaka Palace, a dinner at the Imperial Palace and had signed diplomatic notes for the extension of Yen 2.0 billion of Japanese grant aid. The Japan-Tanzania Association had sent more than fifty people to the welcoming ceremonies and had presented a Japanese doll to the President. In Kyoto the Presidential party had visited several historic places such as the Kinkakuji Shrine, Nijo Castle and, in Osaka, several electric factories.

A SILENT DISASTER
‘It is a typical day at the University of Dar es Salaam. Ernest Maganya arrives a little breathless for the class he teaches in Developmental Economics, for he has been getting his usual practical experience in the subject. His professor’s pay of US$ 75 per month is enough to feed his family for- about a week, and he supplements this by ferrying produce and chickens to market every morning in an old pick-up truck.

So began an article in a recent issue of the JAPAN TIMES quoting from the LOS ANGELES TIMES. ‘Down the hill from the classrooms’ the article went on ‘student President Matiko Matara arrives back in his office in the student center from which he was escorted at gunpoint two days earlier by the Tanzanian security police. The police had been questioning him about his role in fomenting an eight day student strike ….. they accused him of being on the US Central Intelligence Agency payroll.

There followed a paragraph about the closure of the university. This story could be written about any of more than forty institutions of higher learning on the continent of Africa …. the condition of African universities night be described as a silent disaster. There are no dramatic photos, no heart-rending personal histories. But the cradles of African leadership are almost uniformly victimised by physical collapse, a ‘brain drain’ fuelled by ludicrously low salaries and political unrest. Government hostility, donor neglect and decades of mismanagement and inept planning are helping them crumble’ … .

‘The library at the Dar university is useful more as a chronicle of the institution’s past than as a study tool. In the periodicals room scarcely any of the technical journals are up to date. The file of Psychological Abstracts stops at 1963. Current biography at 1977. The most recent World Almanac is 10 years old. Bound volumes of the Times of London Index stretch back 30 years but the most recent issue available is dated 1977 …. ‘.

TAFICO – A CHEQUERED HISTORY
In an article under the title ‘The Fisheries of Tanzania’ WORLD FISHING in a recent issue endeavoured, in two pages, to describe the whole of Tanzania’s fishing industry.

‘In 1974 the Government established a State-controlled fishing company TAFICO ostensibly to develop, manage and exploit all aspects of the marine fishery with particular emphasis on shrimps. TAFICO has had a chequered history since its inception. International aid donors with good, albeit misguided intentions, contributed vessels of varying designs ranging from 20m beam trawlers from Australia to 10m vessels from the UK, Finland and Japan …. the result was predictable: machinery of a multitude of origins and designs soon broke down with no provision for spare parts or other back up services. Boats became discarded with minor mechanical faults, to lie rusting on the beach in Tanzania’s humid climate. In essence, epitomising in microcosm what should not be done in developing countries which lack trained technical staff and support facilities.

Happily. in recent years. the Government has reviewed its policies. TAFICO is now being assisted by Japan which is providing technicians and operating new prawn-catching vessels of the very latest design. Prawns are caught, processed and packed on board, ready for export. Foreign vessels under license have also been allowed into the fishery thus sharpening the competitive edge. Earnings have increased dramatically.
Paradoxically, the local artisanal fishery is still the main producer of fish, accounting for some 85% of the total marine catch. It is a fishery that has remained virtually unchanged for hundreds of years ……. ‘.

ILL-CONCEIVED AID
‘By the year 2000 at the cost of US$ 1.9 billion of western aid Tanzania’s potholed road network will be restored to 70% of what it was in 1975. It is a damning assessment for a country which has consistently been ranked one of the world’s top aid per capita recipients’.

So began an article highly critical of aid to Africa in the August 11th issue of the FINANCIAL TIMES. The article went on: ‘Between 1970 and 1989 Tanzania received about US$ 9.5 billion of foreign assistance. Aid workers from Peking to Stockholm poured fistfuls of money into the country to shore up an African experiment in alternative development … Socialism and Self Reliance. But 20 years of self reliance have made Tanzania more dependent on imports and foreign aid, currently running at just over $1.0 billion a year, than almost any other country in sub-Saharan Africa. And, apart from the leaps forward in literacy and the provision of rudimentary rural health services, there is little to show for the massive handouts of assistance … there had been wanton mismanagement of the economy. But poorly designed and implemented development projects combined with bad advice from donors also contributed to Tanzania’s economic malaise’

The Swedish Ambassador was quoted as having said that “Tanzania came to symbolise our hopes in Africa. We supported a development policy we thought was correct and which appealed to the philosophy of our own country. But it was not successful. Sweden and others helped to drag Tanzania into the crisis”.

The article described the World Bank sponsored Morogoro Shoe Factory as a good example of an ill-conceived industrial strategy combined with very poor project design and the Norwegian sponsored Mbegani Fisheries Development Centre (Bulletin No 36) as a ‘hare-brained scheme’

WHY SHOULD AN ECONOMIC GIANT SWINDLE ONE OF THE WORLD’S POOREST NATIONS?
Under this heading the Japanese newspaper ASAHI SHINBUN reported recently that a Japanese dealer in second- hand cars in Nagoya had had printed a glossy circular offering refurbished Japanese cars at bargain prices on receipt of cash from Tanzania. The cars did not arrive as promised. The Japanese embassy in Dar es Salaam issued warnings through the newspapers that some 50 people had responded and had lost their money. In all a sum of US$ 170,000 had been lost. A Japanese businessman in Dar es Salaam had subsequently written to the ASAHI SHINBUN appealing to Japanese people to compensate those Tanzanians who had been exploited and for the government to stop such schemes. The car dealer has been expelled from the Nagoya Chamber of Commerce.

PLENTY OF SULK, LITTLE BULK
Sulk (Nuna) and Ire (Hamaki) sound rather bizarre as labels for political parties; but they are indeed the initials that stand for the names of two of the dissident political groupings that met in London recently as joint signatories to a challenging letter addressed to the Chairman of the sole and ruling party in Tanzania – the CCM.

So began an article in the July issue of AFRICA EVENTS. The article went on: The document welcomes ‘the initiative of the CCM Chairman in allowing the introduction of. … competing parties in the political system of Tanzania, suggests changes in the Constitution to allow for multi-party activity and asks for the elections to be postponed to give time for new parties to register and campaign.

‘Oscar Kambona who fell out with Nyerere in the sixties, and is now in exile in Britain, is the leader of one of the parties the Tanzania Democratic Front. The monarchist Zanzibar organisation, dual based in Portsmouth and Dubai. …. endorsed the petition. Hamaki, led by … .. .. Marxist ex-Umma Party activists based mainly in Copenhagen were also there…… The Tanzania Action Front, centering around the highjackers of a Tanzanian civilian plane a few years ago were not to be left out. There were also the Nuna and Tanzania Youth Democratic Movement parties.

Observers in London are … . rather at a loss to understand how such a …. combination could ever possibly have been achieved …… there is a common streak running through the leadership … most were once in senior positions in the cabinet, the civil service or the army … . they see a chance to snap back into the great whirlwind excitement of politicking in the centre rather than the outer wilderness of foreign lands’.

GOLD SALES START TO SHINE
In the June 25th Issue of the AFRICAN ECONOMIC DIGEST there was an article describing how the Bank of Tanzania had exported 196 kilos of gold worth £ 1.0 million In seven weeks since it took over responsibility for gold sales from private traders. This compared with 1,087 kilos exported over seven years between 1982 and 1989. 196 kilos were exported to the Bank of England for purification. Purity in gold content was rated at 84.7%

The Bank of Tanzania has ordered 24 weighing scales to expand its buying activities nationwide. Since its takeover of gold purchases, black marketeers have pushed prices up in an attempt to defeat the Bank. On June 16th therefore the Bank announced that it was raising the price from July 1st in on attempt to drive out the black marketeers.

WHY THE UNIVERSITY WAS CLOSED
AFRICA EVENTS in its August/September 1990 issue published a three page analysis aimed at determining the reasons for the closure of the University of Dar es Salaam by the Government on May 12. The Sokoine University in Morogoro remains open. The article concluded that there was still a lack of agreement about the real cause.

It traced the events: a 12 day ‘Baraza’ amongst the students, joined at one stage by some members of staff; a student delegation to the President to invite him to come to the university to ta1k to them about their grievances (the control of the student organisation by the youth wing of the ruling party; education cuts; shortages of space, books, medicines etc; cuts in their spending power for food and lodging); a promise by the President to do so after a forthcoming overseas visit; the refusal of the students to return to their classes; a strong ultimatum from the government; an eventual reluctant return to classes; return of the President and his refusal to meet the students because they had originally disobeyed his instruction to return to classes; the placing on walls of all kinds of filthy posters by the students. The government stated that it was forced to take action because of the d6ngerous security situation that was developing.

AFTER TKE RAINS
AFRICAN CONCORD wrote in its June 4th issue about the aftermath of the very severe flooding which Tanzania has suffered from this year.

‘It began as a trickle. But all too suddenly the heaven’s bowels opened and the rains came down in torrents. Tanzanian meteorologists have not seen such floods for more than ha1f a century. Worst hit regions were Lindi, Mtwara, Arusha, Dodoma, Tabora, Mara, Shinyanga, Morogoro and Kilimanjaro. 200,000 people have been displaced from their homes.

Tanzanians themselves raised some US$ 268,000 to help the victims and the country received foodstuffs, tents, medicines blankets, utensils and building materials as well as cash donations from foreign donors.

IT IS DEMOCRATIC
In a seven page article in the April issue of THE PARLIAMENTARIAN Tanzanian MP, Mr Philip S Marmo, compared aspects of democracy in Tanzania with democracy in certain other states. He pointed out that in the last 25 years, on average, more than half the incumbent members of Tanzania’s Parliament, including senior government Ministers had failed to be returned at elections. This meant a high degree of leadership circulation. Under one-party conditions elections tended to be much more unsafe for personal political careers than in countries where parties competed with each other’. Furthermore, the Tanzanian system allowed the electorate to choose the most competent persons as MP’s rather than having to vote for persons chosen by competing parties.

PARLIAMENTARY MATTERS

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The National Assembly’s 1990/91 Budget session began on June 5th in Dar es Salaam. The Assembly faced 885 questions from members and debates on all the different ministerial budgets. On its first day it voted to shorten the session by two weeks to give way to the Presidential and Parliamentary electoral process which was due to commence in August. The first stage, registration of voters began in August rather slowly and there were signs in some parts of the country of apathy.

In the Budget debates the Ministry which had the toughest time was the Ministry of Communications and Works. Debate took the House to the verge of dissolution as member after member put the government to task over transport problems in various parts of the country. Three MP’s threatened to block the estimates and one called for the resignation of the Minister, Dr Pius Ngw’andu. The Member for Sumbawanga withdrew a shilling from the Ministry’s vote demanding an explanation as to why the government had again shelved a plan to put tarmac on the road Tunduma-Sumbawanga-Mpanda. The Minister had explained that he proposed to improve the gravel on the road. At this stage, Prime Minister Joseph Warioba intervened and said that, under the regulations of the House it was too late to introduce a token vote whereupon several member’s said that the Parliamentary Regulations would have to be amended. After a weekend to cool off, the Member was asked by the Speaker whether he had now changed his mind. He replied “No”. At this stage the Attorney General was called in to explain the rules. The House decided to approve the Ministry’s estimates less one shilling in order to establish a token vote. The Prime Minister then explained that the House had rejected the Budget by its actions and that meant that the House had to be dissolved.

At this stage the Speaker set up a Party Committee which met behind closed doors. When the Members came together again in the evening it was stated that the Minister had agreed in writing to improve the road and the unhappy Member thereupon withdrew his objections.

During other debates, among the many suggestions made by Members were the following:

– Radio Tanzania should become independent;
– the ban indirectly imposed by Archaeologist Margaret Leakey on further research at the Olduvai gorge should be lifted;
– Ambassadors should be vetted before their appointment;
– there should be clarification on the criteria used by the government to determine coffee prices;
– prices of drugs at private pharmacies should be controlled;
– the government should cease to call for frugality;
– financial resources should be directed to help small farmers or they would disappear from the economic scene:
– delays in implementing Parliaments’ recommendations should cease.

Ministers announced that:

– installation of a television network for the mainland is expected to start in 1991;
– the government has increased prices for the main crops as follows:

Arabica coffee Shs 65.55 (old price Shs 55)
Robusta coffee Shs 60.50 (Shs 55)
SG cashewnuts Shs 110 (Shs 84)
UG cashewnuts Shs 73 (Shs 56)
Tea Shs 28 (Shs 17)
Pyrethrum Shs 120 (Shs 60)

BUSINESS & ECONOMY

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THE BUDGET – AND THE DEBT PROBLEM
The main headline in the Daily News on June 8, 1990, which covered the 1990/91 Budget read ‘TAXES DOWN’. Taxation on salary income was reduced from between 10% and 50% to between 7.5% and 40% minimum taxable income moved up from Shs 1,900 to Shs 2,250 (the current exchange rate is about Shs 330 to £1); the minimum wage was raised by Shs 425 to Shs 2,500; the maximum salary for executives in the super scale category was raised to Shs 22,930 per month.

And so there was some reason for satisfaction amongst taxpayers. People had expected something worse.

But the new Minister- for Finance, Mr Stephen Kibona, made many other changes in his budget designed to create new sources of government revenue, ease tax collection and entice people to use bank accounts and save or invest in the economy. The Bulletin has space for only a summary of the many changes made.

The Minister began his speech with good news on the economic recovery programmes. The increase in production in key sectors of the economy which had been recorded since 1986 had been maintained in 1989 and consumer goods were still available throughout the country. The GDP had grown by 3.9% in 1987, 4.1% in 1988 and was projected to grow by 4.4% in 1989. This compared with an average GDP growth of 1.5% in the years preceding the economic recovery programme.

But, the Minister said, the objective of improving foreign exchange earnings had not made significant headway and the goal of providing drugs and medicines for hospitals and dispensaries, education and water for the people had been only partially achieved. Major problems existed in crop processing and transportation and in management in the cooperative unions and parastatals; there was a lack of accountability and a need to reduce red tape.

THE EXTENT OF TANZANIA’S DEBT
Mr Kibona went on to say that Tanzania had continued to experience serious problems in servicing external debt. Roger Carter has been looking into this problem in some detail and reports that, while Brazi1’s and Mexico’s debts are from private sources, over 931% of Tanzania’s foreign debts are of official origin ie: from governments or inter-governmental bodies. In 1988 Tanzania’s long-term debt amounted to US$ 4,091 million and by December 1989, according to the budget speech, had reached US$ 5,090 million. In 1988 earnings from exports and services were barely a third of the cost of imports and, of those earnings, near1y 18% was paid out for interest and repayments. In 1970 the debt burden had amounted to 20% of the GDP. But by 1988 it had reached 165% or the equivalent of the total wealth created over a period of almost 20 months.

The Minister stated that negotiations with creditor countries to reschedule or cancel debt obligations had proved very useful. Debt amounting to US$ 51 million had been cancelled and US$1,102 million had been rescheduled during the First Economic Recovery Programme (1986/89). During the Second Phase of Economic recovery (1989/92) some US$ 175 million had been cancelled and US$ 270 million was being rescheduled. As Roger Carter points out, Britain and the Scandinavian countries have been converting loans into grants for some years. Multilateral debts, which account for 35% of total long-term debt, consist mainly of World Bank loans incurred in the optimistic late sixties, they carry interest charges of around 8%; IDA (an affiliate of the World Bank) credits charge no interest and there 1s a grace period for repayments of ten years. A scheme has now been evolved for the use of IDA credits for the repayment of capital to the World Bank and in the financial years 1988/89 to 1990/91 about US$ 48 million of IDA money was made available. This met about 70% of the capital repayments due to the Bank during that period. Sweden and Norway have granted US$ 33 million since April 1989 towards the interest element in World Bank debt servicing.

Nevertheless, Tanzania’s debt burden seems likely to increase. Grace periods for IDA repayments will end and completion of earlier repayments for IDA credits still lies some years ahead. On the other hand, repayment of Bank loans will be completed in the next few years. On balance, the servicing of multilateral debts is expected to grow only slightly. Bilateral and private debt servicing however, is expected to increase by something like 35% between 1990 and 1993, yielding by 1993 a total obligation of some US$ 585 million, a figure in excess of Tanzania’s total current export earnings.

OTHER BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS
– to encourage the use of sources of energy other than firewood and charcoal, taxes on electric and kerosene cookers and solar heaters abolished;
– the obligation for visitors to change US$ 50 at airports abolished;
– road tolls abolished except at border posts; extra Shs 2.0 per litre on petrol and diesel;
– customs duty highest rate down from 100% to 60%;
– no change on beer, spirits, soft drinks, cigarettes, sugar;
– to encourage people to use banks, minimum taxable bank interest income raised from Shs 20,000 to Shs 250,000 per year;
– airport service charge for residents increased from Shs 500 to Shs 800; no change for visitors (US$ 20); vehicle registration up from Shs 2,000 to Shs 8,000;
– a new ‘instant’ lottery introduced.

INFLATION
The Minister of State (Planning), Prof Kighoma Malima, told the National Assembly on Budget Day that the rate of price increases for most consumer goods was slowing down. For most towns it was 23.8% in 1989. This meant that the inflation rate had slowed down by 4.5% compared with 1988 and was now the lowest since 1980. However, the rate was above the Economic Recovery target; it had been hoped that the rate of inflation would have been reduced to less than 10% by 1989.

CDC PLANS BIG INVESTMENTS
The Commonwealth Development Corporation (CDC) plans to invest in joint ventures in Tanzania in 1990 in such sectors as agriculture, forestry and tourism according to the CDC Representative in Dar es Salaan The Corporation intended to provide US$ 50 million to rehabilitate the Kagera sugar factory. £ 8.5 million to rehabilitate the coffee industry in the Kilimanjaro and Arusha regions and probably, depending on the result of studies underway, further funds would be made available for tea plantations in Njombe, the improvement of the Kilimanjaro Hotel, and in wildlife lodges in the northern tourist circuit – Daily News

SENSA 1988 – PRELIMINARY REPORT OF THE CENSUS

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Few African countries can match Tanzania’s good record in census enumeration. There have been three censuses since independence – in 1967, 1978 and 1988. In spite of some organisational difficulties mainly concerned with lack of transport to carry enumerators to the more remote areas, the degree of accuracy and the facilities of the census office are now quite impressive. What a change from the 1931 census when ‘headmen of villages were required to produce seeds of four different plants to indicate the men, women, boys and girls respectively in their areas’! The preliminary report of the 1988 census was published in mid- 1989 and some significant features emerge from it.

It revealed that the total population was 23,174,336, almost a million less than the 1987 forecast of 24,000,000:

………………1978 ….1988
Mainland 17,048,329 (+3.3%) 22,533,758 (+2.8%)
Zanzibar 479,235 (+2.7%) 640,578 (+3.0%)
Total 17,527,564 (+3.3%.) 23,174,336 (+2.8%)

Figures in brackets refer to the average annual growth rate for the previous ten-year period.

There are more females than males in the total population. giving a male/female sex ratio of 96 per 100.

This is significant because it represents a slowing down in the rate of population increase for the first time since records began. However, even this ‘slower’ rate of 2.8% per annum is rapid by world standards and, if continued, would lead to a doubling of the country’s population in only 25 years. Furthermore, in Zanzibar, the population growth rate has increased slightly compared with the previous period.

REGIONAL GROWTH
Coast, Mara and Ruvuma regions grew faster between 1978 and 1988 than they did In the previous inter-census period. The sharpest decrease in the growth rate was experienced in Dar es Salaam, Tabora and Kagera regions. Other regions showed a slight decrease or no change. These variations between regions are the result of migration rather then natural increase. It is at the smaller scale of districts that significant trends can be observed.

URBAN GROWTH
It could be argued that the outstanding demographic characteristic of Africa today is rapid urban growth, which is occurring at a rate unparalleled in any other world region. Migration and natural increase contribute equally to the process in Africa’s case. The situation in Tanzania is that the overall rate of urban growth has slowed down during the decade, largely because of a slowing down of Dar es Salaam’s growth.

The figures for urban population growth are as follows:

TOWN 1952 1957 1967 1978 1988
———~~,- — –”
DAR ES SALAAM 99,140 128,742 272,821 757,346 1,234,754
MWANZA 13,691 19,871 34,861 110,611 182,899
ZANZIBAR – – – 110,669 157,634
TANGA 22,136 38,053 61,058 103,409 138,274
MBEYA 5,566 6,932 12,479 75,505 135,614
MOROGORO 11,501 14,507 25,252 61,890 117,760
ARUSHA 7,598 10,038 32,452 55,281 117,622
MOSHI 9,079 13,726 26,864 52,223 96,838
TABORA 14,031 15,361 21,012 67,392 93,506
DODOMA 12,262 13,435 23,559 45,703 88,473
IRINGA 8,013 9,587 21,746 57,182 84,860
KIGOMA 11,600 – – 50,044 77,055
MTWARA 8,074 – – 48,510 76,632
MUSOMA 4,937 – – 32,658 63,652
SHINYANGA 2,480 – – 21,703 63,471
SONGEA 990 – – 17,954 54,830
SUMBAWANGA 2,116 – – 28,586 47,878
LINDI 11,330 – – 27,308 41,587
SINGIDA 3,125 – – 29,252 39,598
BUKOBA 3,570 – – 20,430 28,702

Dar es Salaam’s growth rate was down from 8.1% to 4.8% p. a. But this slower rate could give Dar a population in excess of 3 million by the year 2004 with further demands on the city’s infrastructure. Some other towns are growing very rapidly, for example, Moshi, 6.2% p.a. and Mbeya, now the fastest growing town in Tanzania, 6.7% (giving a doubling every eleven years). The table above indicates the huge gap between Dar es Salaam and the second town, Mwanza. It is also apparent that, in spite of government policies to promote Dodoma as the capital, its growth has been modest. It was the fifth largest town in 1952 but was ninth in 1988. Changes in the relative size of towns may be partly attributed to changes in Tanzania’s external relationships. For example, the strengthening of political and transport links with Zambia and SADCC countries seems to have had a positive impact on Mbeya while the collapse of sisal exports may underlie Tanga’s relative decline.

Urban growth in the past was due largely to migration of males in search of work, resulting in high urban sex ratios. In 1978 for example, there were over 120 men for every 100 females in Arusha, Bukoba and Moshi. The 1988 census reveals that this male dominated urban sex ratio has declined in nearly all towns from an average of 110 in 1978 to 105 in 1988 but this is still higher than the average of 96. This unbalanced sex ratio is not caused by differential fertility between districts, but by migration from rural to urban areas. Whereas in the past this movement was male dominated, the declining urban sex ratios reveal that now it is increasingly female dominated. Indeed, in the case of some towns like Mbeya there are now more females than males. Its sex ratio of 95 is below the national average. Only three towns, Zanzibar, Kigoma and Mtwara went against the national trend and showed an increase in sex ratios because of inward male migration.

The effect of migration upon rural areas has been to produce a divided Tanzania, at least in terms of its sex ratios. Two broad areas of the country are male dominated. The first extends from the coast between Dar and Tanga and extends inland to Morogoro and from there to Arusha and the Kenya border, with an offshoot from Morogoro to Kilombero district. The second lies further west and extends from Chunya northward through Tabora to Kagera and the Uganda border. Both these areas offer prospects of wage employment for males, in cash crop production or in small industrial enterprises like mining, as is the case in Chunya. Adjacent to these are the female dominated rural districts. The largest forms a huge belt of the country extending from the Mozambique border northwards through Iringa, Doodoma and Singida to Mara. There is a smaller female dominated pocket In the Pare and Usambara mountains of the north-east. These areas experience male outward migration because their harsher environments or more peripheral position have depressed the opportunity for economic activity.

Two broad points can be made in conclusion. Firstly, it would appear that government policy since 1967 – villagisation, decentralisation, capital city relocation – which potentially had large scale implications for the distribution of population, has not had a major impact upon the demographic situation in the country. Migration to urban areas continues, and even if the growth of Dar es Salaam has slowed down, that of many regional centres has not. Dodoma’s growth is less than one might expect and reveals that central location may be insufficient to offset other perceived disadvantages.

Secondly, although the rate of growth has slowed down, the annual addition of some half a million people to the country’s population is still considerable and increases the pressure on resources such as cultivable land. Furthermore, the youthful population structure, with 45% of the population below sixteen years, places an enormous burden upon health and education services.

The Economic Survey for Tanzania (1988) recorded a growth rate for the economy of 4.1% compared with a population growth of 2.8% As a result, the average per capita income showed an increase for the first time in a decade. Of course it does not mean that the benefits will be felt by the average Tanzanian immediately but at least it is a move in the right direction.
Clive Sowden

Mr CLIVE SOWDEN is a Senior Lecturer in Geography at Newcastle Polytechnic and has also, on three occasions, been a Visiting Lecturer in the University of Dar es Salaam. From 1958 to 1964 he was an Education Officer mostly at Tabora Boys’ Secondary School.

OBITUARY

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The Bulletin of Tanzanian Affairs regrets to inform its readers of the death on June 4th 1990 of Sir Bernard de Bunsen after many years spent in the service of East Africa. He is chiefly remembered for his work in connection with the setting up of the Makerere University College through which so many subsequent leaders of Tanzania passed. His association with Tanzania continued until 1975 because of his involvement with the establishment of the University of East Africa of which he became the Vice Chancellor and which included the then Dar es Salaam University College.

In 1972 together with Roger Carter, he visited the then Tanzanian High Commissioner in London, Mr George Mhigula, to discuss the possible creation of a voluntary organisation linking Tanzania and Britain which resulted, in January 1975, in the setting up of the Britain Tanzania Society. Sir Bernard served the society first as its Vice-Chairman and, after his eventual retirement in 1985, as Vice President.

REVIEWS

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UNESCO GENERAL HISTORY OF AFRICA. ABRIDGED EDITION. Volumes I, Il and VII. Editors respectively J. Ki-Zerbo, G. Mokhtar and A. Adu Boahen. Different editors for each volume. James Currey Publishers. May 1990. £4.95 each volume.

This history, which is being undertaken as a result of an instruction given to the Director General of UNESCO at its 16th General Conference, ‘does not seek to be exhaustive and is a work of synthesis avoiding dogmatism’ according to the International Scientific Committee set up in 1970 to organise its production. Two thirds of the thirty nine members of the committee are African. ‘The aim is to show the historic relationships between the various parts of the continent’. The fact that the history seems to achieve this aim means that those interested primarily in Tanzania may be disappointed.

Volume I which covers Prehistory might well prove the most satisfying to a Tanzanian readership. Much prominence, with illustrations, is given to the 1.8 million-year-old fossils of hominid form found in Tanzania’s Olduvai Gorge. It is useful to have them placed in the context of all the other fossil forms discovered around the world including even older ones in South Africa. At Olduvai, and also in Kenya, Indonesia and China, excavators have discovered what is now known as Homo erectus which were more advanced on the evolutionary scale than any of their forerunners. As this history, in which there is a refreshing absence of the ‘triumphalism’ of which the Leakeys have been accused, puts it, ‘whether Homo erectus was the final stage of development leading to Homo sapiens remains uncertain’.

Tanzania is mentioned as one of the homes of the earliest known humanly fashioned tools – 3 to 1 million years ago – small quartz fragments showing signs of cutting and wear. Tanzania’s well known rock paintings of the Late Stone Age also get a mention as well as do tools of the Acheulian industrial complex 190.000 years B.C.

Volume II – The Ancient Civilisations of Africa – is less informative on Tanzania – if the index is complete! The small separate groups of Sandawe and Hadza peoples of North Central Tanzania are described under the heading ‘The Southern Savannah Hunting Tradition’. There is also extensive coverage of the Kushitic pastoral tradition of Lake Victoria and the crater highlands of Northern Tanzania and what is described as the ‘now rejected Hamitic Myth’ is briefly debated. ‘The point is that, while the more illogical and romantic aspects of the various and vaguely stated Hamitic hypotheses do derive from prejudiced European scholarship and grotesque attitudes towards Africa, the factual bases of these views were not entirely fictitious. Some of the observations were acute and certain of the historical interpretations very judicious’

Readers of the Bulletin are likely to be more familiar with the history of the period covered in Volume VII – Africa Under Colonial Domination 1880- 1935. To them therefore this volume will be less satisfactory. There are however numerous scattered references to ‘Tanganyika’. ‘The methods of European advance varied from place to place … on the whole they were characterised by the use of force combined, where possible, with diplomatic alliances … The response of Tanganyikans also varied. The coastal people clashed with the Germans in 1888, the Hehe in 1891. But the Marealle and the Kibanga near the mountains of Kilimanjaro and Usambara, allied with the Germans in order to defeat their enemies’.

This volume treats issues of interest to Tanzanians with extreme brevity. The ‘Missionary Factor’ in Southern Africa is covered in half a page and the Tanganyika African Association, which was founded as long ago as 1929, gets a paragraph. The whole area of ‘Politics and Nationalism in East Africa 1919-35’ is covered in nine pages and most of these concentrate on the situation in Kenya. There are scattered items here and there which may be debatable such as that ‘the Africans in several highland areas of Tanganyika won against the colonial authorities (in the planting of coffee) faster than the administration could destroy the trees’.

To sum up, these volumes are highly readable and contain a vast amount (1,106 pages) of interest to historians, professional and amateur alike. The volumes are also quite remarkably good value for money – DRB.

FAMINE IN EAST AFRICA: FOOD PRODUCTION AND FOOD POLICIES. Ronald E Seavoy. Greenwood Press, New York. 1989. £ 38.70.
(This review appeared first in the International Journal of African Historical Studies’ – Editor)

The intention of this book is to provide new insights into the centuries old problem of famine in East Africa. The reader is informed in the Preface that the author has already established the ‘revolutionary distinction between subsistence and commercial social values’ in a previous book. Bracing oneself for further mind-expanding revelations, one is not left in suspense for very long. In Chapter 1 the differences between peasants and the rest of the world are outlined. According to the author, the view that peasants are poor, lack income and employment, and are dominated by non-peasant classes, is thoroughly false. This view overlooks the essential truth, namely, that peasants are ‘indolent’. The rest of the book is primarily an exercise in citing literature to illustrate this point. Dr Seavoy has a fairly large bibliography and there are many authors who would cringe to see their work interpreted in this way. Because the boundaries of East Africa are never clearly established, the reader is bombarded with citations from all directions. Looking at the maps, however, one assumes that the book’s focus is Tanzania. Indeed the argument centers on Tanzania.

One important qualification to the argument relates to gender. Dr Seavoy equates ‘peasants’ with male peasants. Wives and children of ‘peasants’ are extremely hard working. High fertility is a clever strategy on the part of the peasants to avoid more work. It is never explained why wives and children are not gripped by a commercial weltanschauung despite their successful triumph over indolence.

The author seems unaware that he 1s not the first to rail against ‘lazy natives’. The theory of backward sloping labour supply curves and target workers is portrayed as a reality of the present day. The author bemoans the fact that development economists, marxist social scientists and senior political leaders of East African nations have all overlooked the essential truth. Both Nyerere (p. 178) and McNamara (p. 225) lack understanding of the fundamental indolence of peasants. As far as the author is concerned, Nyerere’s villagisation programe did not go far enough and the World Bank is completely wrong to suggest that peasants should receive higher producer prices since they are, after all, target earners. It seems that the only way that peasants are going to experience a ‘commercial revenue’ is through more forceful coercion. In the author’s words: ‘A policy of creating and rewarding commercial cultivators thus requires large investments In full-time police, paramilitary units, and an army …. Contrary to what most development economists believe, investment in armed force (sic) is one of the most productive investments that can be made by the governments of peasant nations …. All armed forces must be prepared to enforce commercial policies on peasants with maximum amounts of violence if necessary (p. 26).

One has visions of Dr Seavoy in a tank mowing down all those misguided development economists and Marxist social scientists who are ‘devotees of the cult of the peasant’ (p. 221), clearing the way for his single-handed conquest of peasantdom.
Deborah Fahy Bryceson

TANZANIA: AN AFRICAN EXPERIMENT. Rodger Yeager. Second edition, revised and updated. Dartmouth publishing Co. Aldershot. 1989.

The first edition of this book, published in 1982, received warm praise; this present second edition is no less meritorious. Dr Yeager’s ability to write clearly and with the minimum of technical jargon will recommend this text to the general reader, while the African specialist will find a great deal of well-researched and -referenced material for study.

As the author points out in his preface, much has happened since the first edition went to press. He singles out two events in particular, the ‘near collapse’ of the Tanzanian economy find the retirement of Mwalimu Nyerere from the Presidency. ‘These turning points have caused me to re-examine the Tanzanian experiment and to record the result in this new edition’ he explains (p. xi).

The substantial part of the revised text deals with the economic crisis resulting from Tanzania’s balance of payments difficulties in 1979 which led to the country’s approach to the IMF the following year. Dr Yeager reviews the debate that opened up in the ‘party government’ between the pragmatists and the idealists, between those prepared to accept elements of the IMF’s free market/private enterprise medicine, and t hose who remained committed to the principles of Ujamaa socialism even when they involved considerable material sacrifice.

While the author has presented both sides of the debate with a measure of objectivity, his own preference for a pragmatic solution, ‘without sacrificing the larger goal of an equitable and democratically integrated social order’ (p. 150), emerges strongly in the concluding chapter, where he rejects ideologically-motivated social engineering projects such as the villagisation scheme of the mid- 1970’s and ‘resource draining benefits’ such as the subsidisation of urban food prices (pp 150-51).

However, Dr Yeager does not show how the politics of pragmatism will make Tanzania less dependent on developed countries, and in on earlier chapter devoted to its international position, sets out the goal of ‘interdependence (between Tanzania and its trade/aid partners) under acceptable terms’ (p 141) without indicating how this can be achieved. As his book demonstrates, Tanzania has become more dependent on outside aid and investment throughout the 1980’s, with loans from the international agencies like the IMF, further aid from donor nations, the return of transnationals like Lonrho and a series of currency devaluations to assist exports. Events since this text went to press, such as the December 1989 $1.3 billion international aid package, provide further evidence of this trend.

Of course, one must appreciate the fact that Tanzania’s options are severely circumscribed, as event s before the 1980’s crisis – dealt with fully in this revised edition – indicate.

The Tanzanian experiment, launched by the Arusha Declaration (1967), had won the sympathy of many doctrinaire leftists (and moderates too) in the West, who hoped that ‘self reliance’ would enable Tanzania to lessen, possibly end, its dependence on the developed world. Its highly publicised shortcomings have been explained in terms of (inter alia) climatic and environmental problems, policy and planning mistakes and an excess of zeal by party activists associated with villagisation. All of these factors are discussed in some detail by Dr Yeager.

His book is less successful when it comes to the macroeconomic factors responsible for the country’s poor performance in the 1970’s and 80’s: the ‘scissors effect’, the steady deterioration in its terms of trade with the ‘North’ – expressed in Mwalimu Nyerere’s reference to the increasing quantity of sisal the nation had to sell to keep up with the rising prices of Western tractors; the widening economic gap between North and South highlighted in the Brandt Report; a continuing crisis in the global financial system following the breakdown of fixed exchange rate mechanisms in the early 70’s; and the international debt crisis of the 1960′ s.

It is true that these global factors – mentioned for the most part only cursorily in this book – cast a different light on the mistakes made in the past by the Tanzanian Government. But it is also true that resolution of these structural problems in the world economy is beyond the ability of anyone government (whether in the North or South).

In the meantime, immediate and pressing economic problems demand immediate solutions. Whether or not President Mwinyi and his colleagues will discard the Tanzanian experiment along the way only time will tell, but few readers will dissent from Dr Yeager’s conclusion that so long as advances continue to be made in health, education and other social services, roads and marketing facilities, agricultural credit and cooperat1ves, and local government institutions, the nation and community-building core of the Tanzanian experiment will remain intact.
Murray Steele

SUPPORT OR SUBVERSION: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN FARMING SYSTEMS RESEARCH AND TANZANIA’S RURAL DEVELOPMENT POLICY OBJECTIVES. Larry S. Lev and Ann L Shriver. Journal of Rural Studies. Vol 6. No 1. 1990. 12 pages.

This paper states that its aim is to facilitate improved communication between Farming Systems Research personnel and national policy makers; it points out that the long-term success of any farming systems approach is dependent upon effective cooperation with government. The paper then compares and contrasts the two different approaches in a Tanzanian context during recent years.

It writes that since independence Tanzania has embarked upon a wide variety of rural development initiatives including the introduction of communal production systems, the massive resettlement programmes, price controls and the establishment of parastatal marketing agencies. These policies were formulated to achieve specific societal goals such as greater equity, the provision of social services and the feeding of the urban population. In contrast, the Farming Systems Approach focuses on understanding the problems and opportunities of individual family units and on setting in motion a process of technology generation that will increase the productivity of these families.

In the early years these approaches were far apart. Recently, however, although Tanzania has been adopting a variety of new more liberal agricultural policies it is still not clear whether the state’s involvement in the country’s economic life will change since no clear commitment to a change in the overall ideology of state control has yet been articulated. The current phase may represent an attempt to maintain donor financing by acceding to external demands for reform rather than through a fundamental reduction of the role of government.

Because the current era is more friendly to the farming systems approach, policy makers are displaying a growing acceptance of the wisdom and rationality of farmers and hence an interest in the collection of data that can assist in determining farmer reactions to infrastructure investments and policy actions. The government’s decision to rely increasingly on the carrot rather than the stick meshes closely With the farming systems approach philosophy.

WAGON OF SMOKE. AN INFORMAL HISTORY OF THE EAST AFRICAN RAILWAYS AND HARBOURS ADMINISTRATION. Arthur F. Beckenham. Cadogan Books Ltd. 1989. £16.00.

According to a review in the ‘Overseas Pensioner’ this 200,OOO-word 400-page book covers the period between 1948, when the largest public transport under taking in the whole of the British colonial administration was inaugurated, through the merger of the Kenya and Uganda Railways and Harbours and the Tanganyika Railways and Port Services into a single organisation, and 1961 when the inter-territorial East African High Commission underwent its metamorphosis into the East African Common Services Organisation. For the rail way buff the book is said (in the review) to represent a veritable encyclopaedia of professional details, technical data and the minutiae of institutional history. There are three dozen illustrations and numerous maps, diagrams, tables and the names of over 150 locomotives – Editor.

TANZANIA: SURVIVING AGAINST THE ODDS. A CAFOD Report by Seamus Cleary. 1990. £1. 0
This is a 36-page booklet of seven chapters in which the author writes concisely about the geography, the history and the people of Tanzania as well as its relations with Southern Africa and the current state of its economy.

HERE BE DRAGONS. A TV Channel 4 ‘Survival’ Film June 6 1990.
A young piano pupil played a gentle pastoral piece with brisk determination until her interpretation became tender at the thought of eating lemon ice cream in the bath. I wonder if a Grumeti crocodile has tender thoughts. He probably thinks of his last banquet which may have been months ago. He and his companions seem too large and too many for the meagre reserves of fish, frogs, nestlings or small mammals that they can catch, scavenge or steal.

The first part of this film concentrated on these crocodiles. The tiny Grumeti river flows westward through the Serengeti to Lake Victoria. By the end of the dry season it has shrunk to 8 series of pools. Before that an army of wildebeest thunder towards it during their migration. They stop to drink. The nearly submerged predators are waiting. All is quiet until a thrashing crocodile leaps up and drags a wildebeest into the water. Other crocodiles join in and the carcass is torn to pieces. Of the thousands of wildebeest, the crocodiles kill a few dozen. The rest continue their journey. The crocodiles are satiated and live off this banquet until the same time the following year.

The next part of the film takes us across Lake Victoria, over the tumultuous Murchison Falls to the waters of the Nile below. Beyond the torrents crocodile mothers come to land to lay their eggs. In so doing they not only provide for the future of their race but for the future of many other creatures. They are unwilling providers of food. Predators wait until the dangerous mothers are away to steal and eat some of the eggs. When the mothers are present they have no chance. In fact the monitor lizard lives dangerously and is so nervous that he can be scared by the aggressive display of a dikkup. The dikkop chooses the crocodile beach because of the unwitting protection the crocodile can give, and she can deceive her by feigning injury and luring her away from her nest if the crocodile shows interest in it. Weaver birds live overhead protected from snakes by the presence of the crocodiles. The mother crocodile digs to free her babies when she hears them chirping and, as soon as they are hatched, carries mouthfuls of them down to the river. Equal numbers are snapped up at the nest by eagles, monitor lizards, the marsh mongoose and others. When the mother crocodile has rescued all she can she stays with them in the river. They often rest on her back and are utterly charming, but, in spite of all her efforts, only one or two will survive into adulthood.

The team of Alan Root, Mark Deeble, Victoria Stone and the officers and scientists of the National Parks of Tanzania and Uganda deserve our thanks.
Shirin Spencer

TA ISSUE 36

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TA 36 cover

ENTIRE CABINET TOLD TO RESIGN
“I WANT TO SEE RESULTS” – MWINYI
SERIOUS FLOODS
IMPLICATIONS OF CHANGES IN EASTERN EUROPE
NELSON MANDELA IN TANZANIA
SIXTY YEARS OF MISSIONARY WORK
TANZANIAN ARTISTS COMING TO BRITAIN
10 BOOK AND JOURNAL REVIEWS