Magufuli's Stance Reaps Dividends

By Katare Mbashiru in Dodoma

A WHOPPING 20.8bn/- has been injected into the government's coffers as more parastatals yesterday responded to President John Magufuli's directive to pay dividends to the government.

Some 187 entities were issued with 60- day ultimatum by the Head of State to pay dividends to the

government or risk their Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and their Board Chairpersons get the sack.

A good number of the state-owned companies and agencies have responded to the president's call with 13 more entities coughing up over 5bn/- yesterday.

Thus, as of yesterday only 36 entities were yet to bow to the directive and are racing against a looming deadline.

They have until January 23 to honour the obligation warned the Minister for Finance and Planning Dr Philip Mpango yesterday, insisting the management and board of the respective PEs, should not take the directive as a joke.

"Their CEOs and Board Chairpersons have until January 23, 00:00am to honour the directive or else they should prepare handing over their offices," warned Dr Mpango as he received the latest payment from the thirteen PEs at the treasury building in Dodoma.

The entities and the amount paid in brackets include the University of Dar es Salaam (1bn/-), Open University of Tanzania (100m/-), Mzumbe University (137m/-), Moshi Cooperative University (150m/-), Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (110m/-) and University of Dodoma (500m/-).

Star Media Tanzania Limited also gave dividend for the first time yesterday, contributing about 500m/-.

Dr Mpango commended Dr Ayub Rioba for firmly overseeing the implementation of the contract between Star Media and TBC.

Speaking on the sidelines of the handing over ceremony, Treasury Registrar, Athuman Mbuttuka said following Dr Magufuli's directive issued on November 24, last year, a number of public entities immediately started paying government dividends.

According to the Treasury Registrar, between November 25 and December 11, about 12.2bn/- was contributed to the government, while from December 12, 2019 to January 7, 2020, the dividend paid was 8.7bn/-.

"We have received about 20.8bn/- as of January 7, 2020, and we expect to receive more from the remaining 36 public entities," said Mr Mbuttuka.

Vividly upset by their poor financial performance, President Magufuli threatened to shut down all public parastatals, agencies and other institutions that would defy his order.

He noted that the government spent 59.6trn/- investment capital in the companies and was expecting nothing but returns from the investment.

He gave the organisations' board chairpersons and their chief executive officers up to January 22, 2020, to give dividend to the Treasurer Registrar and Finance and Planning Minister or relinquish their positions.

He spoke shortly after receiving dividend from 79 government institutions, authorities and agencies worth over 1.05trn/- where he announced that the government had invested at least 59.6trn/- into 266 institutions.

"Unfortunately only 79 institutions are returning the favour," he said, adding: "the time to plead with each other is over and we cannot tolerate seeing the government continue to lose."

According to Dr Mpango, revenue collection from 79 out of the current 266 public entities was 1.1tril/- by the time Dr Magufuli received dividend on November 24 last year.

"As of December 30, 2019, about 1.07tril/- had been collected from public entities, against 673.6bn/- which was collected during the corresponding period from 46 entities in 2017/2018," noted the minister recently when issuing the state of the country's economy.