Tanzania Looks To The Future By Ahmed Danso 

The former vice president of Tanzania, Samia Suluhu Hassan, is now declared the new president of Tanzania after disputed violent presidential election. Hassan won with nearly  98% of the votes, after leading rivals were excluded from the race. She took power in 2001 after the sudden death of her predecessor, John Magufuli, said in her speech afterwards, ‘’It’s time to unite our country, not to destroy what we we’ve built over more than six decades.’’

She highlighted that Tanzanians voted overwhelmingly for a female leader, and added: ‘’We will take all actions and involve all security agencies to ensure the country is peaceful.’’ But John Kitoka, the spokesman for the Western-backed main opposition party, Chadema, which was barred from taking par t in the election, slammed Hassan’s victory as a ‘’mockery of the democratic process,’’ and called for the intervention by a credible body to oversee another fresh election.

However, the African Union Chair, Mohammed Ali Youssouf, in statement congratulated Hassan but ‘’deeply regrets the lives lost in the post- election violence’’.

The country remains fiscally dependent on external financing, with aid still accounting for some 23% of government revenue in 2023, although this is declining. Hassan said the violence that followed her election could hurt access to international funding. Alex Vine, the African director of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), says there has been ‘’a campaign of harassment and intimidation’’ towards the opposition in Tanzania. It is clearly not a credible election.’’

Tanzania under Magufuli ran on a platform of reducing government corruption and spending while also investing in Tanzania’s infrastructure and implementing economic nationalism. His key policies included cancelling the independence Day celebrations and used the budgeted fund to widen part of a highway notorious for gridlocks in the main city of Dar es Salaam, the state capital. That was coupled with firing a number of government bigwigs for corruption, renegotiating mining contracts with European multinational companies, and restrictions on Lesbian, Gay,Bisexual,Transgender,andQueer(or Questioning),LGBTQ rights.

Magufuli stopped all foreign travels for public servants.  A Central Bank report in early 2017 revealed that the government had saved $430m by limiting foreign travels between November 2015 to November 2016. The president himself did not travel outside East Africa since he became president. He had only toured neighbouring Kenya, Rewanda, and Uganda. His longest journey was to Ethiopia in 2017 to attend (AU) meeting.

Tanzanians saw the face of Western corruption in their country with the exposure of the Richmond scandal when a contract was improperly awarded a US-based electricity firm and resulted in the resignation of the Prime Minister. The former president banned the export of metallic concentrates.

Miners in Tanzania had been sending heaps of earth containing metallic ore to Asia and Europe for smelting, but the content and quality had always been a contentious issue.The miners insisted it had a low commercial value. In March 2017, the country’s largest gold miner, London-listed Acacia Ltd, was accused of flouting the ban. Magufuli ordered the seizure of more than 250 of its containers at the port of Dar es Salaam.

Investigations revealed that Acacia had under-declared the value of the ore, skewing the amount of tax it had to pay. Armed with the findings, Magufuli’s government slapped the company with a   mammoth tax bill of $190bn, covering the 17 years it had been operating in the country.

While Acacia denied any wrong- doing, its parent company Canada-based Barrick Gold opted for talks. In October 2017, Barrick offered to pay the Tanzanian government $300m to resolve outstanding tax claims and would share equally any ‘’economic benefits’’ from Acacia’s operations in Tanzania with the government in future

When Magufuli died in 2021, then –Vice President Hassan appeared on state television to announce that Magufuli was dead and declared two weeks of national mourning. Many speculated that Magufuli had contracted COVID-19, the disease whose outbreak he handled with constant controversy. Hassan instead told the nation the president had died from chronic heart condition.

But for many,, the pandemic is almost certain to be one of the most  defining issues of  Magufuli’s presidency. As the coronavirus took hold  across the globe, Magufuli downplayed its severity and pointedly rejected the idea of locking down. Tanzania officially stopped reporting case numbers in April 2020, remaining open to travelers and without restrictions on social gatherings.

Magufuli said the virus was a Western hoax and could not survive ‘’in Christ body’’. He also mocked mask-wearers and told Tanzanians to treat flu-like symptoms with steam inhalation and other traditional herbal medicine.

With some US senators hypocritically calling for a review of the election in line with the position of the opposition, and raising alarm that Tanzania’s rising post- election violence poses a threat not only to its own citizens but also to neighboring nations, including Kenya and wider East African region. African leaders must support Hassan to succeed for the sake of its citizens and peace in East Africa.

The US, with its Msata military base in Tanzania, and determined to protect its mining interests, the entire East Africa will soon be plunged into crisis as Hassan seek for loans to run the country amid her predecessor’s complex legacy with the West, leavened on diversifying Tanzania’s partnerships.

*Danso writes from Kano