Opinion
Analysis
Preaching peace is necessary
Last week the people of Zanzibar commemorated 41 years since the Spice Islands
were liberated from the hands of colonialism in 1964. Marking the day was indeed
a momentous event for Zanzibaris.
They have every reason to reminisce the suffering their fathers went through,
especially the atrocities and crimes against humanity committed against
civilians in their own land.
The revolution day is a reminder for them to look forward and how they can
safeguard their struggle for independence.
In his speech, delivered before multitudes of people thronged at Amani Stadium,
President Amani Abeid Karume reminded Zanzibaris of the history of their
liberation and urged them to defend their unity and solidarity by keeping away
from violence.
It was certainly important for the president to stress unity among Zanzibaris in
the run-up to the general elections in Tanzania.
Ever since Tanzania adopted a multi party system in 1992, there has been some
despicable feeling among particular politicians who mislead people for their own
gain. We think that it is vital that people should avoid all events likely to
tarnish a good image of the nation.
It is not our intention to revive anger and bitter memories, but the events of
January 26 and 27, 2001 in which over 17 people lost their lives as a result of
political skirmishes cannot be forgotten and should be taken as a lesson so that
nothing like that should happen again.
The exercise of voter’s registration in the permanent register has triggered
some problems in Pemba. Such events should not have happened at all bearing in
mind the tragic events that happened in the past.
Politicians from the opposition parties, Civic United Front in particular, have
been linked to some problems in one way or another. It is therefore ideal for
them to continue preaching peace.
As President Karume insisted, there is no alternative when it comes to defending
the Union of Tanganyika and Zanzibar.
Welcome to the corporate
public space
After a shorter sojourn abroad Tanzania has come to look different. The sun does
not beat my skin any harder, the assistant at the airport does not ask for more
tips than usual and the traffic jam is not slower than when I left the country
three weeks ago.
What has changed, made its presence greater, made its initiators richer is the
increasing number of adverts, commercials. Everywhere. All with the underlying
message: buy more from us; choose us and make us your life long companion.
It hit me strongest shortly after touch down. Welcome to the International
Airport of Dar es Salaam, I read on the airport terminal building. Thank you, I
thought to myself, it feels good to be back. Welcome to our Celtel nation, I
continued reading in bright yellow letters, significantly more visible, readable
and bigger on the banner where the word Salaam ended. No thanks, when is the
next flight back, I muttered to myself.
Tanzania is not a nation built by mobile phone users, lived by mobile phone
users or enjoyed by mobile phone users. Nor amalgamated by a mobile phone
operator.
So I started thinking, in the car home. Along the main roads, small roads, bumpy
roads, adverts are there. New sign boards are erected to allow for more adverts.
When did all this start? Why has not anyone complained? Have the public been
asked if they approve?
I’m not asking for a Tanzania saved from adverts, harsh commercial interests and
plain corporate greed. Tanzania is also part of the globalised world (whatever
that means). I’m asking for some sensibility, perhaps taste, certainly
consideration.
There must be someone who has been asked if it is ok to put a huge commercial
banner on the airport terminal building. Someone who thought, yes it sounds like
a good idea, why not. Someone who gave the go-ahead to allow more adverts to
line our roads. Someone responsible.
What it all comes down to is how we manage our public spaces. Should we allow
the corporate world to invade the space which we, the citizens, occupy all day
and which is owned by us?
Tanzania has few spaces which have been designed purposely for its citizens;
most of them are run-downed and lack incitement. But putting an advert in that
space does not make it more attractive, fun or enjoyable; despite glossy
printing, bright colours and beautiful and happy people depicted. Someone once
said that if it was not better in the past, it was at least not worse. Welcome
to the corporate public space.
TLP leadership quarrel needs sound solution
By Evarist Kagaruki
Maverick politician and chairman of the Tanzania Labour Party (TLP), Augustine
Lyatonga Mrema, is never free from political troubles. He first got in trouble
with the ruling party, CCM, sometime in 1995 in the run-up to the first
multiparty elections in the country. He had fallen victim to the machinations of
his party colleagues who saw his rising popularity (arising from his
anti-corruption crusade) as a hindrance to their own presidential ambitions and
were fully determined to see him go into political oblivion.
CCM had, long before the process of presidential nomination began, spelled out
leadership qualifications required of its presidential candidate. One of them
was that he or she had to have at least a University degree. Mrema had only
College diplomas. So he perceived the “degree criterion” as deliberately and
specifically aimed at stopping him from joining the presidential race.
In a pre-emptive and rather dramatic move, he invited himself to a sack when,
during a parliamentary session in Dodoma (his last one as a CCM MP), he made a
lengthy and defiant speech in which he attacked the government (on which he
served as Home Affairs Minister and Deputy Prime Minister), accusing it of
graft. President Ali Hassan Mwinyi summarily dismissed him!
In response, Mrema quit the grand party and defected to the opposition where the
NCCR-Mageuzi received him with open arms and immediately made him their chairman
and the party’s presidential candidate in the October 1995 elections. His
political capital was, and has always been, his popularity – which has waned
over the years any way.
After the elections, and Mrema’s defeat, we saw the NCCR-Mageuzi and the party
chairman’s credibility, popularity and lustre plummet. The party became
fractured and fractious as Mrema quarrelled with his learned and politically
agile Secretary General, Mabere Marando, over power. Mrema was accused of, inter
alia, “undermining his fellow leaders” and “dictatorship”. The infighting was so
serious that it threatened the peace in the country. Marando, one of the
founders of NCCR-Mageuzi, and his colleagues in the top echelons of the party
(most of them members of the intellectual class) regretted why they had invited
Mrema in the first place.
A disoriented Mrema abandoned the NCCR-Mageuzi (which he had helped weaken) to
join the Tanzania Labour Party (TLP) at the invitation of its chairman and
founder, Leo Lwekamwa. Mrema had a sizeable constituency in the NCCR-Mageuzi,
which shifted together with him, and this helped strengthen the political base
of the TLP which, all of a sudden, became one of the major parties in the
country.
For some time all seemed to be fine between the invited guest and his hosts. But
after Mrema had settled and the honeymoon ended, trouble started over who was
really in charge. We all know what transpired thence. A case still rages in
court about the dispute over the leadership of the party. The government
subvention (ruzuku) to the party has been suspended, and now the Registrar of
Political Parties, John Tendwa, has threatened to proscribe the party if it will
not have conducted elections to fill the vacant positions of leadership by
February 24, this year. According to Tendwa, the TLP Chairman, Mrema, is the
only elected leader.
This is interesting and surprising, considering that the party conducted
elections in February last year! How can Mrema defend this position? Doesn’t
this support the perception that he runs the party as his own property? The
Registrar is generally right when he says that the party is the property of all
the people regardless of whether they are members or not. But, strictly
speaking, the legal ownership of any part falls in the hands of its members, and
not anyone else.
In that sense, Tendwa would not be doing the members of the TLP justice if he
decided to outlaw the party for the reasons that he has given. Why should the
members be punished for the shortcomings of the single leader? I think that
Tendwa should find an amicable, sober way of resolving the TLP elections problem
in the interest of not only the party members but also the nation. The “national
interest” is traceable in the fact that TLP is not a small party that one can
just strike off the register (by a stroke of the pen) without causing disharmony
in the country. And that, definitely, would not be in the interest of democracy
and progress.
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