THE words used in the title of this
article are borrowed from a statement made in 1960 by Soviet Statesman
Nikita Kruschev, (1894 – 1971). Indeed, he was not just making an idle
joke, for a story is told of a candidate who was campaigning for a seat
in one of the Indian State Legislatures, who promised to bring all the
facilities which were missing in his constituency.
Said the candidate: “if I am elected, I
will bring dispensaries, schools, roads, and bridges . . .” At the end
of his speech, a member of the audience asked him the question: Sir, we
have no rivers in our area, where will you put the bridges which you
have promised to bring? His answer was: “thank you very much for drawing
my attention to a problem which I was not aware of. You mentioned the
lack of rivers in this area. I promise here and now, that I will take
care of that problem too. I will bring the rivers also!”
Fortunately, none of our Presidential
candidates in the just ended general election promised to build bridges
where there are no rivers. But practically all of them promised to bring
“change”.
That was good and welcome news, because
everybody wants change; provided, of course, it is a change for better. A
promise of some ‘change’ which cannot be implemented belongs to the
same category as the promise to build bridges even where there are no
rivers, in the sense that the objective cannot be achieved.
The promises made by the Presidential
candidates. (i) The promises made by President Magufuli. Some people,
and a section of the mass media, have been expressing doubts to the
effect that the President made too many promises during his campaign
speeches, and that it will not be possible for all of them to be fully
implemented.
It may therefore be helpful to explain
the following : (a) That the source of all the major promises made by
President Magufuli is the election manifesto of Chama cha Mapinduzi
(CCM). Under normal circumstances, the CCM manifesto promises are
included in the party’s manifesto only when the Party is fully satisfied
that they are capable of being implemented.
This is because the source of all the
projects listed in the manifesto is the government’s Five-year
Development Plan for the relevant period. These Development Plans
normally identify the various projects which are to be implemented
during the relevant period, and they also allocate the money necessary
for their implementation.
Hence, since President Magufuli’s
promises are based on what is contained in the party’s manifesto, which
in turn is based on the government’s carefully prepared Five year
Development Plan, the probability of their implementation should be very
high; except of course where, as has been the case in the past, the
expected funds (especially donor funds), fail to show up! In which case
it will not be his fault at all. (b) With the advantage of hindsight, we
now realize more clearly what President Magufuli was actually promising
in terms of ‘change’.
For we now know that he was promising
change in the style of leadership. And indeed, he has manifestly
demonstrated this ‘change’ already during his first week in office, by
abandoning the seemingly relaxed style of his predecessor, and adopting a
much more robust style of leadership under his captivating slogan of
“hapa ni kazi tu”.
This proves that positive change can in
fact be achieved by the same ruling political party, simply by changing
its top leadership. (ii)The promise made Presidential candidate Edward
Lowassa.
Presidential candidate Edward Lowassa,
on his part, made a very firm and solemn promise ‘to remove CCM from
power’. Said Lowassa on the day he joined CHADEMA: “Ndugu wana-Chadema, I
have joined you for a purpose: to remove CCM from power”; and went on
to elaborate that the said objective “would be accomplished in the early
morning of October 25th 2015”.
Well, October 25th has come and gone,
and the results of the election have been announced, which show that CCM
has retained power; not only by winning the Presidency but, even more
important, by winning a vast majority in the National Assembly. As will
be explained below, that is the constitutional requirement for a
political party to become the ruling party.
The parties who wanted to remove CCM
from power, also helpfully gave their reasons, which they expected would
convince the electorate to vote CCM out of power. Their publicly
expressed reasons were that “CCM has done nothing for the development of
this country for all the years they have been in power, and in
particular, that they have completely failed to eliminate poverty from
among the people. Therefore the only solution is to remove CCM from
power”! The electorate listened, but eventually said ‘no’.
Remembering George Orwell’s Animal Farm.
Those who are familiar with English literature may as well wish to
amuse themselves by re-reading the pages of chapter 1 of George Orwell’s
novel titled Animal Farm, which describes the animals leader’s dream of
a viable solution to all the problems which were facing the animals of
England, namely, the elimination of their real enemy, the human race!
George Orwell’s novel was published in
England in 1945, and was described as “the most important work of
fictional political satire to be written in 20th century Britain”. The
relevant story of the animal leader’ speech is told in the following
words:- “Comrades, you have heard already about the strange dream that I
had last night. I have had a long life and I have had much time for
thought as I lay alone in my stall.
And I may say that I understand the
nature of life on this earth as well as any animal now living. It is
about this that I wish to speak to you now. “Comrades, what is the
nature of this life of ours? Let us face it, our lives are miserable,
laborious and short. . .
No animal in England knows the meaning
of happiness or leisure after he is a year’s old. No animal in England
is free. The life of an animal here is only misery and slavery, that is
the plain truth. “But is this simply part of the order of Nature? Is it
because this land of ours is so poor that it cannot afford a decent life
to those who dwell upon it? No, comrades, a thousand times no!
The soil of England is fertile, its
climate is good, it is capable of affording food in abundance to an
enormously greater number of animals than now inhabit it. Why then do we
continue in this miserable condition? Because nearly the whole of the
produce of our labour is stolen from us by human beings. There,
comrades, is the answer to all our problems. Man is the only real enemy.
Just get rid of man, and all the produce
of our labour will be ours own. Almost overnight we could become rich
and free. Remove man from the scene, and the root cause of hunger and
overwork is abolished for ever. . . What then must we do? We must work
day and night, body and soul, for the overthrow of the human race”. That
is my message to you comrades.
Rebellion!” But of course that is only
fiction, intended for the amusement and recreation of the mind, because
animals cannot make speeches! But the similarity of objectives can be
identified. (CCM is the source of all the people’s problems, it must
therefore be overthrown).
Realistically however, as will be shown
below, CCM can indeed be removed from power when it has outlived its
usefulness, by peoples’ power duly expressed through the ballot box. We
will return to this point a little later. Understanding the
Parliamentary system of governance.
I am aware that many Tanzanians are not
fully familiar with the Parliamentary system of governance, simply
because such awareness and understanding requires the possession of some
substantial knowledge regarding matters related to constitutional
theory and practice.
The relevant books of authority state
that “the good or bad fortune of a nation depends on three factors: its
constitution, the way that constitution is made to work, and the respect
it inspires”.
Thus, substantial knowledge ‘of our
country’s constitution, the way it is made to work, and the respect it
inspires’ is therefore absolutely necessary for a proper understanding
of how Tanzania is governed. But, unfortunately, such knowledge and
understanding is not readily accessible to a significantly large section
of our community It may therefore be helpful to give some brief
information regarding this particular subject.
The Parliamentary system of governance.
Our country operates what is known as the ‘Parliamentary system of
governance’, which is basically the British system of governance which
we inherited at the time of independence.
The most distinctive feature of this
system is that it is a system of ‘government by political party’, which
simply means that political parties have the right to compete for votes
at a general election, and whichever party obtains a majority of the
seats in its parliament, secures the right to become the governing (or
ruling) party, In other words, it secures the right to form the
government of the day.
At the time of writing this article, the
results of the parliamentary elections which had been announced showed
that by that time, CCM had scooped a handsome 188 parliamentary seats,
out of the 256 seats whose results had been announced. This is a very
substantial majority, which already enables Chama cha Mapinduzi to
continue comfortably in office as the ruling party in the National
Assembly.
Under this Parliamentary system, in case
no political party succeeds in securing the required parliamentary
majority, two or more parties may negotiate with a view to forming a
coalition government.
However, coalition governments are not
always easy to form. This is illustrated by India’s experience after
their 1996 general elections. These particular elections failed to
produce a party with the requisite majority which would enable it to
form the government of India. It thus became necessary to form a
coalition of parties for that purpose.
Negotiations between political parties
duly took place, but they still failed to produce a coalition with the
required majority. They then tried to form what is known as a ‘minority
government’, i.e. a government which does not command a majority of
members in Parliament. But they knew very well that this cannot possibly
work under the Parliamentary system of governance.
This minority government lasted in
office for only 13 days, and had no choice but to resign before the
newly elected Parliament had assembled for its first business, out of
the knowledge that they would be thrown out of office through a motion
of no confidence at the very first meeting of Parliament.
A political pundit in India humorously
described this failure to form a viable coalition in the following
words:- “It was like a cemetery, those who were inside could not come
out, And those who were outside did not want to get in”. Can CCM be
removed from power? I have said before in this column, that the answer
to this question is obviously ‘yes’, but only if the majority of voters
at a general election collectively decide to do so.
However, this will happen only in a
situation when the majority of the voters are truly convinced that the
ruling party has outlived its usefulness, or perhaps on account of some
scandal such as unethical conduct on the part of its public leaders,
particularly relating to the hated ufisadi.
It certainly cannot happen merely
because the opposition Movement for Change wants it to happen, and that,
just for their own benefit, namely merely in order to enable them to
take over that power themselves.
The results of the just ended general
election have confirmed the fact that the great majority of the people
of Tanzania are still satisfied with the performance and service
delivery of Chama cha Mapinduzi; which explains why they have given this
party such an overwhelming parliamentary majority in the just ended
general elections.
This means, in effect, that even if
Edward Lowassa had won the Presidency, CCM would still have continued to
be the ruling party in the National Assembly, but with an Opposition
President in State House.
A very undesirable situation, which
would have provided fertile ground for endless constitutional conflicts
between the President and the National Assembly! Fortunately however,
the electorate has saved us from such a nasty situation., in the sense
that “Peoples’ power”, duly expressed through the ballot box, has not
only sent Dr. John Magufuli to State House, but has also given him a
comfortable majority in the National Assembly.
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