The rise and rise of ceremony industry in Tanzania

y = f(x) is probably the most re-used statement in math and engineering. Founded by Euler, it reads, y is a function of x. Emerging during Form Three additional math class, students instinctively hate it, but, hate or like, it comes to make permanent presence in our day-to-day lives. The stuff in parentheses can take a head-spinning complexity to describe a normal, uncomplicated scenario.
That brings us to the blog subject: Tanzania, by the ranking in the UNDP Human Development 2010 Report, is among the poorest nations in the World, ranking 148th in the 160-nation list of world nations. It is surpassed with countries marked by internal strifes such as Zimbabwe and Liberia.
Not only is Tanzania peaceful, it also has the largest landmass among the countries of East Africa, as well as many kilometres of rivers and square kilometres of lakes.
One might think with all this contrasting situation, Tanzania would be rushing to drag itself out of this fix at the bottom of nations to climb up to its rightful place where other nations with similar blessing on the human development chart roost, countries such as Malaysia (57) and Algeria (84). It is to the contrary: Where hard work to tap the fat of the land would be a logical direction, people have concentrated in providing services that has the effect of collecting the little money the individuals get (meagre salaries for employees, bribes for uniformed officers, corruption stash for politicians, and under-priced sales by farmers) and blowing it up in ceremonies. The function takes the shape

This is the social equation of ceremony. Sometimes ago, "ceremony" would be referring to wedding. No longer so. Now we do have graduation (from pre-school, from primary school, from o-level, from a-level, from first degree, from 2nd degree, from 3rd degree, from degree mills (pacific western type)etc. ceremony might also be referring to send-off and to bereavement.
Ceremony comes with many things, therefore the Schroedinger-like equation above. In that equation, c represents any of the several ceremonies named above. Mc is the Master of Ceremony. Some individuals that are wordy have been popular lately, whereby they do that alone for living. Since the carreer goes on in places one can hardly avoid liquor, and liquor has bad reputation of damaging vocal cords, they try to avert this by swallowing raw eggs every now and then, said to smoothern the voices. C is catering. D. T. SM. V etc. shall be the subject of the next post.

Tanzania and corruption: a run-away

From a blog quoting Sunday Observer article:

I posted some stuff on the above in some of my earlier messages such as this one. Nothing has happened on the home ground regarding the matter, it's life as usual. But media and British Govt investigators have kept right up.

Here we are, right in the midst of vigogo grab-grabbing, then living expensively from the plunder proceeds, and go brag-bragging in the circles of friends about his kids studying in American universities, four SUVs of latest models in his mansion garage, etc etc. and no-one seems to say anything except a briton thousands of nautical miles away (investigating fraud by british firm, at that; and in the course, opening up our can of worms). Even them the discussion takes form of gossips in blogs and online forums while Umma suffers.

With the global village of www, will the situation remain like this all the time? I doubt it.

Mramba-It didn't have to come to this

Yesterday, a bombshell of political news shook the country: Basil Mramba, an iconic respected MP and former minister of various portfolios appeared in court (along with another former minister called Yona) charged with several counts of abusing office.
Now, Mramba earned much respect as a leader who delivered. Perhaps his most outstanding performance was that of being the first executive of the Small Industries Development Organization, an institution that grew and achieved a lot.

How did it happen? How would a man of Mramba's moral standing be caught in such a quangmire, have his systematically built reputation undone?

The likely explanation is, there seemed such confidence of untouchables who were much aware that they were not doing the right, moral thing - we all do have conscience, don't we? Here, then, we had my hero, Mramba, loyally supporting the boss man, Mkapa, who was termed, albeit wrongly by Father of Nation "Mr Clean". And getting reassured that nothing would go wrong.
It didn't have to come to the scenes above, that Kisutu court scenario, the big man himself sitting on a hard bench, not very different from the ones they sit willingly once per week every Sunday morning), and the cheering masses ("rubbering crowd" as O Henry would put it).

Did Mramba benefit financially from this abuse of office activities he is being charged with? Maybe, maybe not, but definitely he knew he was abusing power. What he was (wrongly) sure of was, he might be prosecuted for his actions.

The Alex Stewart Assayers scenario that was central to the accusations against Mramba as Financial Minister during Mkapa (at-CHOOOO!) era was largely unknown to the public. But the cheering crowds in the picture above most likely are those who remember Mramba reacting to protestations about Tz, a poor country, spending lots of foreign exchange to procure a totally unnecessary new presidential jet, publicly announcing a new jet for President would be bought no-matter what, even if it would lead to people eating grass. The jet deal, it would be found out later, was badly weighted, likely corrupt--that one and air traffic control radar.

Mramba-It didn't have to come to this.

This is what Africa needs

Why donors fear Kagame's war on graft


The Botswana Gazette

13.04.2005

http://www.gazette.bw/tbg_buhead2.htm

by Andrew M. Mwenda

  

Last week I was in Kigali, this time at the heels of a cabinet decision to impound all luxurious four wheel drive vehicles bought at government expense and driven by ministers, security and military chiefs, foreign experts and their local handlers. In a morning crackdown, all the big men and women of this republic woke up to find that police constables along the main roads were stopping and taking away their vehicles and leaving them to walk to office.

The international donor community, known all over Africa for its corrupt and profligate life styles which they indulge in the name of fighting poverty, was this time caught with their pants down. They claim to fight poverty while riding in luxurious four-wheel drive vehicles, sitting in opulently furnished offices, earning obscene salaries and living in executive mansions. In a bold act of defiance, Rwanda impounded even those vehicles belonging to donor projects. After cleaning his own government of corruption, he has now taken on the profligacy of the international aid industry and its experts are now scared.

In a discussion with President Paul Kagame, he told me that he had looked at some of the "poverty reduction" projects and they smelt bad. "There are projects here worth only $5m and when I looked at their expenses, I found that $1m was going into buying these cars, each one of them at $70,000.

Another $1m goes to buy office furniture, more $1m for meetings and entertainment, and yet another $1m as salaries for technical experts, leaving only $1m for the actual expenditure on a poverty reducing activity. Is this the way to fight poverty?" he asked as I shifted with glee in my chair.

Already, the government is auctioning these vehicles and so far has gotten over $3m from the sales. Mr Kagame has now issued a new directive, saying government should not purchase cars for its officials with more than 2,500 cc. But there is more: the government has placed a ceiling on mobile telephone expenses for all its ministers, military and security chiefs to 50,000 Rwanda Francs (Shs150, 000), and also ordered MTN Rwanda to cut off their international roaming access.

The directive also stops the holding of workshops, seminars and conferences on poverty reduction in posh hotels like the Intercontinental, Mille Collins etc, insisting they should be in government owned buildings at no cost. The order also requires all government ministries; departments and agencies to move from privately owned buildings where they pay high rents to government owned buildings.

I told Kagame that whereas some of the most highly skilled Africans are going to Europe and North=2 0America to clean streets and toilets, our development partners send us Œtechnical experts on these projects at individual monthly salaries of between $10,000 and $20,000, a salary that could pay 12 Africans of better training and experience and save this continent from severe brain drain. In fact, most of these so-called experts are a miserable, career-stranded lot in their own countries, but are dumped in Africa and other poor countries through foreign aid protocols.

Donors never shy from lecturing our governments on fiscal frugality, yet their aid driven projects are the most profligate. Of total project aid to Uganda's ministry of Health, 93 percent of it goes into technical assistance (i.e. salaries and allowances for the experts) and overheads (i.e. four wheel drive vehicles, opulent office furniture, computers, stationary, tea and cakes).

Only a miserable 7 percent of this aid goes into purchase of drugs. Now you understand why, in spite of a huge health budget, our people cannot find drugs in hospitals. We in the media have been shouting ourselves hoarse against government corruption. It is time to expose the worse forms of profligacy, which forces our governments to pile up huge sums in debt.

In fact, of the total money from the Uganda government budget to the ministry of Health, 98 percent reaches its intended beneficiaries, clearly showing that in spite of its corrupt ways, the government of Uganda is a better evi l than donors. Of total project aid to Uganda, 68 percent goes into overheads and technical assistance. Only 32 percent to its intended beneficiaries.

A few weeks ago I presented the above facts to President Yoweri Museveni and asked him to act. My heart bleeds to say he is so deeply discredited by his inability to tackle corruption in his government, and his own profligate public administration expenditure that he lacks moral authority to take on donors.

The other reason is that his regime lives off this coalition of mutual deceit with donors that both are fighting to eradicate poverty in Uganda. Kagame, however, is able to act boldly because he occupies a moral high ground in fighting corruption, has ensured fiscal frugality and also because his government pursues strategies of survival - not necessarily dependant on donor approval.

In Rwanda, ministers and other high ranking public officials resign and or are fired by the week because of allegations of corruption. From the lowest clerk in a government office to the most powerful minister or military or security chief, no one is immune to jail when they steal; none close to the president, none distant from him. You steal, you get jailed.

If there is some prima facie case that you stole, but there isn't not enough evidence to convict you in a court of law, then you are asked to resign or get fired. What a tough guy this Kagame man is!!

It's baad when a big man helps himself to national cake unlawfully in full view of subordinates

Sometime, say 3 years ago, my cousin's wife (a young lady with respectable job, private car, a couple of kids) came to me breathlessly telling me how I could get rich by enrolling in a certain scheme: you get a form, register and submit with money order of a certain amount, that is distributed to your predecessors up the chain.

"Lady," I said, "Don't you know that this is a pyramid scheme which is just another fraud?" I was remembering my days in Nigeria where I had swallowed line hook and sinker in that fatherland of scams.

"No, shem! This is different, The names of top shots like Mama X and Mama Y were some of the pioneers in this project" . She was calling it a project, Mama X and Mama Y were powerful persons in politics, and of high standing in society. Nevertheless, I just shook my head sadly telling her I can't see the future in the game, or logic of why I should get so much money without hard work.

Needless to say, the scheme did not run more than a week before it exploded into a lawsuit and the rich who had wanted to get richer quickly refunded those they had scammed so as to keep their names out, but some fingers were burnt alright.

There are two things here
1. Many persons look for any means of getting money for nothing - that explains several stories of bribe, pyramid games, going to witchdoctors, mushrooming churches that promise wealth to their followers (in the process licking their nickels) and the like.
2. Ordinary person feels it a justification if a leader--political, religious, doesn't matter--is in a thieving racket.

Which brings the point of corruption in high places. The latest news in Tanzania politics is that of one minister resigning after media revealed he was under investigation for corruption. He makes 4 the number of ministers who have bowed out in the space of 2 months. People are wondering aloud why the ministers who resigned in shame should continue being representatives of their constituencies, why they should continue holding positions in the ruling party and so forth.

(Footnote: The resignation took place on Sunday 20 April, the day when a politician-turned-gunman died peacefully pending verdict of his manslaughter case. )

Not long ago, there was Central Bank scam where millions of dollars were siphoned out of government coffers by bank officials colluding with outsiders who had set up fraudulent companies. Governor was fired.

Again, thanks to Internet, all frauds shall be exposed, so I can only see the ghost of Mwalimu Nyerere being functional, so much did the old man hate thieving politicians. Tanzanian Umma are very much behind the standings of Mwalimu, and it is Umma that shall cleanse the country of hypocrites who had thought themselves untouchable all along.
(WITCHCRAFT, NYERERE, FRAUD INVESTIGATION INTERNET have been subjects of my past posts)

Solidarity Forever - The Dar-es-Salaam Workers Peace March

On Saturday 11 August 2007, The Trade Union Confederation of Tanzania (TUCTA) Dar-es-Salaam Region branch organised a peace march aimed at calling for the Government to raise salaries, particularly the minimum wage which currently stands at about TShs 84,000 [USD 67] per month in public sector, but as low as TShs 45,000 [USD 36] in private sector.

The march was a long one, starting from Mnazi Mmoja grounds to Jangwani grounds, some 3 km distance. Now, trekking is not my favourite pastime, therefore i brought up in the rear at a slow pace. Trekking back there I was looking at the development contrasts along the way: apartment blocks rose on roadsides, and there was a park of sorts, complete with fine, rather new concrete benches. The park had been taken over by humanity at the lower echelons of society, not necessarily mentally deranged, but some who had nowhere to turn to for shelter. This you could tell by the threadbare cloths that have endured soapless washing several times to have acquired a tone distant from the original dye. They also each habitually had a large plastic bag where all they had was stored--toothbrush, a doll picked somewhere in hope of getting a buyer some lucky day, etc, mostly scavenged from trash the occupiers of apartments were throwing away.

I also couldn't help but notice car yards where new, reconditioned and used cars of all sizes were on display for sale. Judging by the number of such open yards mushrooming in all parts of the city of late, several among us had money to buy the mechandise. "Just as well I'm participating in this march", I mused, because with my two degrees and more than twenty years of honest and loyal work, I wouldn't be able to afford a decent station wagon of USD 8,000 (which works roughly to TShs 10,000,000) at the monthly takehome of USD 300. If a miracle would occur and freeze all the bills, and I and my dependants wouldn't need any food to eat, so as to pay for the car, it would take me 27 months to settle the score. But not only do I have to eat and pay bills, the car company shall need its money intact in exchange for the car, not pay in instalments while it uses up the garage space.

Back to the events of the march. I eventually caught up with fellow workers just in time to join hands to sing "Solidarity Forever", signifying things have begun: introductions, some speeches some brass band song (which played more than once the song "Mwalimu Nyerere" a tribute song for the late Father of Tanzania nation). Whenever this music in minor scale is played, it sends deep feelings to the minds of many Tanzanians who feel short-changed by politicians and cunning businessmen who are greedily helping themselves to the national cake while umma goes suffering--there couldn't be such a thing if Nyerere was alive, even if in comma.

The key speech given by the TUCTA Dar-es-Salaam Secretary bared it all:

• can't thwart corruption by public servants if you are offering them salaries that won't last more than a week to buy only essentials.
• can't contain the propagation of HIV/AIDS among the population when the workers have to do anything to make ends meet.
• can't reverse the infant mortality if parently can't afford the very bus fare to health centre (in the cases there is one at all).

Even as thousands of us united there as one and applauded to this speech and others from such key speakers like Professor Issa Shivji (who introduced the phrase "walala heri" as a class above "walala hai" and "walala hoi") we weren't all that optimistic that things would turn rosy overnight. Nevertheless this has been a massively supported class struggle which shall be documented in the trade union movements in the country. More importantly, it sends a loud and clear message to the grabbers of the national cake--from gross imbalance of things to outright thieving through tricky wording of contracts and earning commissions from umma wealth: "Stop, reform. Give umma what is rightfully theirs".

Fraud office is investigating £28m deal agreed by Blair

Revisited from way back in June 2003--BBC article at the bottom of this post. Since then several things have changed. Tanzania has a new president, and Blair has fallen from grace due to Baghdad hiccup...


The Times November 13, 2006

Fraud office is investigating £28m deal agreed by Blair
By Sam Coates
Members of the Cabinet were overruled by the Prime Minister when they queried a BAE Systems contract in Tanzania, writes our correspondent

Protesters dressed as Tony Blair and Sir Richard Evans suggest close
links between the two in 2004 (Nick Ray/The Times)

A CONTROVERSIAL deal personally approved by Tony Blair to send a
multimillion-pound air traffic control system to Africa is being
investigated for corruption, The Times can reveal.

The Serious Fraud Office and Ministry of Defence police are looking
into allegations that BAE Systems paid backhanders to the Tanzanian
Government for a £28 million military air traffic control system.

The Prime Minister overruled Gordon Brown and other Cabinet ministers
to approve the deal, despite warnings from the World Bank that it could
have bought a non-military system for a tenth of the price.

Investigators, who have been studying the deal for more than six
months, made a fact-finding visit to the House of Commons last
Wednesday. They were handed a dossier of evidence compiled by Norman
Lamb, the Liberal Democrat MP who has played a key role questioning the
deal.

The news that a Serious Fraud Office (SFO) investigation is under way
risks reopening one of the most divisive rows of the last Parliament,
which pitted the Chancellor and Clare Short, the former International
Development Secretary, against Jack Straw, Patricia Hewitt and Geoff
Hoon, who were in favour of the deal.


Friday, 14 June, 2002, 08:34 GMT 09:34 UK
Tanzania radar sale 'waste of cash'

A £28m military air traffic control system the UK Government wants to sell Tanzania is a complete waste of money, according to the World Bank. Sources have told the BBC the bank had branded the system old, inappropriate and unworkable in a United Nations' International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) report commissioned by the bank. Tanzania could buy a civilian system for an eighth of the cost, it said. And the British system would not even cover all of the east African country's civil aviation needs, according to the report. Tanzania's President Mkapa has held urgent talks with Tony Blair about the findings, according to press reports. BBC defence correspondent Andrew Gilligan said the report is highly critical and claims the technology is old and inappropriate. Liberal Democrat MP Norman Lamb told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I think this brings into strong question the judgement of the prime minister and Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon. Norman Lamb: Report raises serious questions "International Development Secretary Clare Short made very clear in autumn last year that she was very unhappy with the deal. "And yet they pushed through this export licence in December last year, despite clear evidence the entire system was inappropriate." Manufacturers BAE Systems have accused the report of making false cost comparisons. But Liberal Democrat international development spokesman Norman Lamb has conducted his own investigation. Objections He told The Guardian newspaper: "A modern civilian air traffic control system can cost as little as £3.5m. "The Department of Trade and Industry, with the apparent support of the prime minister, has colluded with British Aerospace and Barclays Bank in foisting an expensive and unnecessary arms deal on the desperately poor people of Tanzania. "It is no surprise the Tanzanian Government have reacted with horror." Clare Short was concerned about the cost Barclays Bank said they do not comment on individual loans but any loan they do make has to conform with export licensing laws. Mr Blair over-ruled objections from Cabinet colleagues, including Chancellor Gordon Brown, to grant an export license for the product last December. Ms Short had argued that such an advanced system was unnecessary and the cash could be better spent. In March she ordered the delay of a £9.7m aid payment to Tanzania pending the results of the report.