Editorial Cartoon
It is during this period when development partners have made a firm stand that they will not release over Sh900 billion meant to support the country’s 2014/15 budget until the government ‘clears the air’ with regard to the withdrawal of Sh320 billion from the Tegeta Escrow account that was being administered by the Bank of Tanzania.
It is the same Escrow account saga that is now threatening the country from either delaying or losing power projects offered by the US government through the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), although the government through ministers for Treasury as well as Energy and Minerals has denied this observation.
When legislature allowed the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to scrutinize the reports compiled by the Controller and Auditor General (CAG), the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) and the Prevention and Combating of Corruption Bureau (PCCB) and prepare a report for submission to the House for debate and eventually come up with resolutions we sighed with relief, hoping things would be settled to bring the situation to normalcy.
Very unfortunately things have gone astray because ruling party members of Parliament, save just a few of them, threw their weight into defending CCM.
What transpired during the debate shocked the public, especially those who believe in good governance, including transparency and public accountability after a majority of CCM members who contributed to the PAC report debate traded cheap politics against the parliamentary watchdog committee, claiming that it had a hidden agenda against some government officials implicated in the report.
The accusations against PAC were shocking, considering the truth that members who were involved in scrutinising CAG, PCCB and TRA reports consisted of nineteen ( 19) legislators from CCM and only five from the opposition parties, giving a picture that CCM were by and large the majority.
Besides, PAC is among the watchdog committees formed and entrusted by Parliament to carry out certain functions on behalf of the legislature as a whole. Therefore, blasting it is tantamount to discrediting and disqualifying the whole parliamentary institution as useless.
On top of that PAC did not come up with its own version of the matter as what it did was to, sort of, get an executive summary from the PCCB, CAG and TRA reports, including suggesting measures to be taken.
Having witnessed that, we, as the public, simply drew the fair conclusion that some CCM members who contributed to the PAC report were all out to ensure CCM interests were strongly safeguarded, and not the public interest.
By saying this we do not intend to insist that all recommendations put forward by PAC were supposed to be adopted by the House-nope! The only concern we are raising here is that treating PAC report as an opposition document by some CCM MPs was a sign of political immaturity.
Tanzania’s national budget depends on donors by over 30 per cent and already we are feeling the pinch after they suspended their budget support. Now, having some MPs behaved that way, shall we have restored donors’ confidence? Time will tell!
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