State respects traditional healers

DAILY NEWS Reporter in Dodoma

Minister of Health, Community, Development, Gender and Children, Ms Ummy Mwalimu

THE government will continue to improve and protect activities of traditional healers considering that over 60 per cent of Tanzanians use their services.

The Minister for Health, Community Development, Gender, Elders and Children, Ummy Mwalimu, told the august House in Dodoma that traditional healers and herbalists are legally recognised by the government through the Traditional and Alternative Health Practice Council, 2002.

She said that the government has so far set-up a new registration system for herbalist and traditional healers, where they are supposed to register at their specific localities under the office of the District Medical Officers (DMOs).

The minister was responding to an additional question from Geita Rural Member of Parliament, Joseph Kasheku who was concerned with the level of education of some of the practising herbalists in the country.

Kasheku wanted the government to come up with an educational plan for traditional healers, especially since many Tanzanians depend on their services. In his basic question, Ushetu legislator Elias Kwandikwa (CCM) wanted to know why the government was arresting traditional healers in Ushetu District.

He also wanted to know the number of traditional healers who have been arrested and arraigned in his district in the period between 2010 and 2015. Earlier, the Deputy Minister for Home Affairs, Hamad Masauni said the government has so far arraigned 26 traditional healers in Ushetu District.

He said the arrested herbalists were alleged to have conducted their services without a legal permit, and apart from that they were not registered. He said some of them were found in illegal possession of government trophies.

Masauni said that in a period of between 2010 and 2015, the police force arrested and arraigned 16 traditional healers. He said that seven among them were found guilty and faced a two years jail term each and a fine of 1.2 million/-.

He said that the police are still searching for one herbalist who was jailed in absentia. Tanzania is notorious for harbouring a large number of herbalists, most of whom claim to cure all sorts of ailments, including HIV/Aids and cancer which has continued to puzzle the medical fraternity.

In 1974, the Traditional Medicine Research Unit was established at the University of Dar es Salaam, and in 1989 the government set up a Traditional Health Services Unit in order to unify traditional health practitioners and mobilise them to form their own association.

Traditional health services were officially recognised in the National Health Policy of 1990, and in 2002 the Traditional and Alternative Medicines Act was introduced.