By Elias Mhegera
October 2010
ALTHOUGH President Jakaya Kikwete has managed to defend his sit for the second five years term but he might face an even tougher uphill task.
According to opinions from various sources, one major challenge is how he will manage to bring back party discipline in the Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) whose intra-conflicts only took a low profile during the pre-election but are yet to resurface in an even more vulgar shape.
Buberwa Kaiza the director of good governance in FemAct a coalition of NGOs says there nothing new that Tanzanians should expect from Kikwete’s government. He says key analysts could observe such weaknesses in his promises during his come back campaigns.
“President Kikwete was full of promises but these could not be substantiated in the policy framework. The president was talking of new ships, roads, international airports but these could not be reflected in the self reliance aspect of the economy, donor dependency is a bad syndrome that should be stopped immediately” he said.
Kaiza who is also the executive director of the Concern for Development Initiatives in Africa (ForDIA), said he the re-appointment of Mizengo Penda as Premier and Ms Anna Makinda as Speaker of the national Assembly is a reflection that there is nothing new Tanzanians can expect from the CCM government. He said removal of Samuel Sitta as Speaker is a big loss, and a set back in the democratization of the people’s House.
With similar views was Mabere Marando lawyer for the Chama cha Demokrasia na Maendeleo (CHADEMA), and one of its principal strategists says the CCM government is obsolete and impermeable for new constructive ideas, thus it has suffered a major blow due to its poor performance in the past five years.
But this stance was vigorously disputed by Captain (rtd) George Mkuchika who is former Cabinet minister in the immediate outgoing government and the CCM’s Deputy Secretary General who says did not lose seats because of poor performance but because the opposition parties have now matured.
“These parties have now penetrated in the rural areas which used to be a political base of CCM, this is a sign that they have grown into full maturity and we in the ruling party must sit and discuss what is to be done,” he said.
He therefore promises that in the next five years Tanzanians should expect good performance as was the case in the past five years. He boasted that Kikwete’s government had a good record in secondary schools up to the ward level, rural electrification and safe and clean water supply.
Mkuchika’s views are challenged by Sam Ruhuza the National Convention for Construction and Reforms (NCCR-Mageuzi) who says CCM is losing track of events in the running of this country therefore the youths should now take the lead.
He adds that it is a known fact that there will be a need to revisit Kikwete’s big promises which appears to overwhelm the meager resources that his government has. But even more, is the fact that the whole government will be busy in preparation for the 2015 General Election after a superb performance by the opposition in this year’s election.
Ruhuza says Kikwete will be doing so with a fresh memory of what happened in Butiama in March 2008 when he sensed a deliberate absconding of some key party figures in the party’s Central Committee, and the National Executive Committee.
The fear is President Kikwete might decide to turn a deaf ear to the media and the civil society in order to retire in peace since if he chooses to restore party discipline it will entail him to punish some of his close associates.
Although remaining mum while the so called ‘mafisadi’ continues to calculate their political base will further damage the party but this will probably put Kikwete personally in a more safer position.
Ruhuza concludes that the CCM government will not even make any attempt to control the bigwigs whose lust for the State House will be the main agenda during Kikwete’s second phase. In such a situation it is vividly clear that even some of those who had shown no interest for the presidency will come back in the limelight.
Ms Lucy Owenya MP from CHADEMA, Special Seats, says Tanzanians should not expect anything new from the CCM government since the same faces will be back in power. However she praises the CCM decisions to appoint Ms Anna Makinda for her post as Speaker of the national Assembly.
Owenya says it is difficult for her to substantiate if at all the grand corrupt ‘mafisadi’ were behind the fall of the former Speaker, Samuel Sitta, “I have no evidence it is not possible for me to comment on that’” she said.
She says that although her party had wanted to exert more pressure in the Parliament an attempt which turned out to be successful, but she thinks it was a rational decision to pick a woman speaker in order to concur with the South African Development Community (SADC) protocol on gender balance in politics.
Peter Kuga Mziray one of the last General Election presidential aspirants, says the last minute entrance of Benjamin Mkapa retired president in the election campaign could be interpreted as an attempt to rescue Kikwete who was quite shaken by the opposition particularly Dr Willibrod Slaa of CHADEMA.
“The whole political trend indicates that the CCM government will not perform better in the next five years because all efforts will be concentrated on how to retain power at all costs, thus this might counterbalance serious national agenda,” he said.
He reminds that there was a growing fear that the EPA scandal and the selling of government houses to some leaders were issues which brought Mkapa back to the political scene.
He therefore warns that the CCM government is there to defend itself amid a growing fear of persecution for its history of wrong doings.
Mziray says the tactical snatch of the Speaker’s seat from Samuel Sitta is another indication that the CCM intra-conflict is not yet over, and this again could affect the performance of the government in so many ways.
Mziray discloses that sadly enough CCM and CHADEMA do share tastes in the sense that they have distanced from the peasants and they are for capitalism, while his party, APPT is for the poor peasants and workers, he is worried that such parties might forget the poor Tanzanians at large.
END
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