How anti-corruption drive has ‘exposed’ JK

Dar es Salaam. President John Magufuli hit the ground running immediately after he was sworn in following his victory in the October 25 General Election. He has since put a performance that took Tanzanians and many others outside the country by surprise. However, as the election dust settles, Dr Magufuli’s performance has resulted in a wave of criticism on the last government led by former President Jakaya Kikwete.

Others are also blaming the 10th Parliament, especially the watchdog committees, asking how they could not have detected the rot that Dr Magufuli unearthed only days after becoming President.

Generally, Dr Magufuli has managed to tighten his grip in two areas, starting with significant cuts in government expenditure. He cancelled Independence Day celebrations, saving more than Sh4 billion which has been released for expansion of a major road in Dar es Salaam. He also scrapped a Cabinet retreat and saved Sh2 billion. This money will obviously be diverted to other uses especially in improvement of social services provision.

Parliament’s inaugural cocktail party budget on Dr Magufuli’s orders was slashed from Sh250 million to Sh15 million. The saved money was used to buy beds for Muhimbili national Hospital. He also placed a ban in all but essential foreign travel by public servants and restricted the first class and business class airfare to the President, Vice President and Prime Minister. The government also prohibited the use of tax payers’ money in printing and distributing festive season cards ahead of this year’s Christmas and New Year celebrations.

The second area prioritised by Dr Magufuli is boosting government’s revenue collection. The government has made a crackdown on Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) and Tanzania Ports Authority (TPA) over tax evasion scam. It seems that Dr Magufuli and Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa, were acting on a report which indicated that from April 2014 to this year some 2,700 containers were cleared at the Dar es Salaam port and released without the owners paying taxes. Clearly, this happened during the last government tenure.

The criticism towards former President Kikwete intensified when the names of companies involved in the scandal were released. Some newspapers and social media users linked Mr Kikwete and his family with the companies.

That forced Mr Kikwete to come out and defend himself and his family last week saying he never issued any directive to spare some businessmen from paying taxes. “There are claims that my family was involved. I was the one in power, and I never issued any order to allow people who were supposed to pay tax not to do so. Neither my son nor my wife could have done so too,” said Mr Kikwete after participating in general cleanness in Chalinze market. The cleanness, was also another Magufuli initiative after cancelling Uhuru day celebrations. He directed that the day should be marked by people participating in cleaning their environments.

The container scandal was unearthed by Prime Minister Majaliwa who has so far made two impromptu visits to the Dar es Salaam Port. Following the Premier visits and what came out, Dr Magufuli fired the TRA’s commissioner general Rished Bade. Later, TPA’s director general Awadh Massawe and the Permanent Secretary in the Transportation Ministry, were also put aside and TPA board was dissolved. Tens of TPA and TRA officers have been suspended, some have been charged and others are still under investigations.

Last week, the ruling party CCM’s Central Committee under the leadership of the party’s Chairman Mr Kikwete expressed satisfaction with Dr Magufuli’s work so far.

Briefing journalists on the deliberations of the CC meeting, the party’s secretary general Abdulrahman Kinana said the party also promised the president full support. However, members of the press did not hesitate to query on the performance of Dr Magufuli in comparison to his predecessor Kikwete.

When asked why the last CCM government never took action against most of the rot that Dr Magufuli’s is currently fixing, Mr Kinana first said; “it is because these things have just been recently uncovered.”

However, reporters pressed him further and reminded him that he is on record to have been criticising the last government to the extent of saying there were sluggish ministers, Mr Kinana said Dr Magufuli was “exemplary in his work.”

“You see, our role as a ruling party is to remind the government of our responsibilities to the people who trusted us with their votes and that was what we certainly did with the last government. It is the role of the government to work on the problems and there’s where the difference lies. This new government is moving with speed to curb all challenges that stands in their way,” explained Mr Kinana.

Parliamentary committees

Kigoma Urban MP and former chairman of the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Zitto Kabwe said on social media that he had been receiving lots of questions why PAC didn’t unearth the TRA and TPA rot in the last Parliament.

Many people who were raising these questions based their arguments on the fact that the Bunge Committees act as watchdog over what the government is doing or not doing. Basing on some issues which the Parliament tackled head on and results were seen, people asked why TPA and TRA inefficiency was not part of Bunge’s strong agenda.

Mr Kabwe, used his Facebook page to clarify that PAC and other Parliamentary Committees did their work properly but the government did not act. He noted that armed with Controller and Auditor General (CAG) reports, as an oversight committee, PAC produced reports which detailed on ports tax evasion scam.

“Based on 2013/14 estimates we observed that TRA’s customs department was losing Sh900 billion annually due to tax evasion and that report was tabled and discussed in the parliament,” said Kabwe adding: “It is the duty of the government to work on suggestions of parliamentary committees, and it is not the role of the committees to prosecute and make a judgment.”

Though the Election Platform could not get in touch with the former chairman of Parliamentary Committee on Infrastructure, Mr Peter Serukamba, but the Kigoma North MP is in record to have censured the way the Dar es Salaam and other Ports were being managed in the country.

Mr Serukamba and his committee were very vocal over unnecessary inefficiency of the major port noting that the government has been losing a lot of money by neglecting the sector which Rwanda leader, Paul Kagame, has been describing as money maker.

Kenya and Magufuli

Dr Magufuli’s performance did not shake Tanzania alone. Up north in Kenya it led to intensification of criticism on the performance of the country’s leader Uhuru Kenyatta who is closing in to three years in power.

A columnist with Daily Nation newspaper Larry Madowo wrote: “Even before he has settled in long enough to change the drapes at State House, new Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli has done more tangible work than Uhuru.”

Kenyans are using Dr Magufuli’s ban on foreign travel as ammunition to pound at Kenyatta, who as president of Kenya has made 43 foreign trips, 10 more compared to his predecessor Mwai Kibaki who travelled abroad only 33 times in his 10 years tenure.

Recently, the country’s social media users ‘mocked’ Kenyatta as ‘visiting’ president. Reuters reported that locals ‘honoured’ that the President, in Nairobi for a few days between international trips, has chosen Kenya as his ‘latest travel destination’. Twitter went abuzz with #UhuruInKenya hashtag which carried a number of mockery messages to President Kenyatta.

Kenyatta had just returned home from series of international travel, starting with commonwealth meeting in Malta, Paris environment conference and Sino-Africa meeting in South Africa before it was announced that he would go to Kigali this week.

Notably, president Magufuli avoided all three meetings, for Malta he downsized the number of Tanzania delegation from 50 to four officials, in Paris Tanzania had a delegation of just three people while he sent his Vice President Samia Suluhu Hassan to South Africa with the company of six other people.

Kenyans on social media even suggested for Kenyatta travel “to Tanzania and learn from Magufuli,” while others joked on the possibility of “swapping presidents with Tanzania for some time.”

The State House had to defend President Kenyatta stating that his frequent foreign trips are meant to unlock capital inflows, secure the country’s interests and cement its regional position.

His spokesperson Manoah Esipisu said that Kenya has closed multi-billion dollar deals, largely with China, and seen increased foreign direct investment (FDI) due to the country’s growing visibility on the global map as the President reaches out to foreign investors.

Nairobi’s Kilimani State House answers echoes to the ones used to be provided by Dar es Salaam’s Magogoni State House officials when Tanzanians were criticising former President Kikwete, who when in power like Kenya’s Kenyatta was a frequent foreign traveller.