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We need a healthy opposition in Tanzania, not this routine desecration of the House

Wednesday June 21 2017
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Parliament in session in Dodoma. FILE PHOTO | NMG

By ELSIE EYAKUZE

The formal political opposition is ailing right now in Tanzania, just when we need it like never before.

While most of the blame rightly lies with an increasingly repressive government, let’s be fair and wag the finger at the opposition too. The Ukawa Frankenstein monster that was glued together prior to the last election was a bad move that played right into the hands of our first-past-the-post electoral system.

And then things got worse for us all. Now we’re stuck with increasing suppression of all kinds of things. And there has been some high-visibility migration of opposition party members to “the other side” via presidential appointments.

Nobody can dispute the noble sentiment behind serving the country and if I am honest, I find people who can cross party lines to work for the greater good admirable.

Most of the time I even think that opposition members who take up presidential appointments do so without cynicism, responding to the urge to contribute their labour meaningfully. I imagine it is endlessly frustrating to be stuck protesting, never being allowed near the machine of the state.

Worst of all must be the loss of support. All too often people will say things like, “Why doesn’t so-and-so just give up, must they make so much noise in public?” I know we’re a young democracy but surely, surely we do understand that the entire raison d’etre of political competition is to, well, compete?

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What do these naysayers want, a quiet parliament where nothing happens and we pass laws without scrutiny? We’ve experimented with that before and just look at how awesome the economy of this most resource-rich land is... not.

While respecting their good intentions, it is time we point out to the presidential appointees that everyone knows the game is rigged against them. Good minds and professionals have suffered the sharp end of a public dismissal via a State House statement at an unprecedented rate in the past two years.

Under the circumstances, it does seem cynical, yes, and self-serving to accept the invitation to “serve the country” at the pleasure of the incumbent when you know you won’t get to. May as well tough it out in the trenches of the active opposition, a service that we need at the moment.

As for the repression of opposition politicians, what a development. No, it wasn’t completely unexpected but the intensity of it is alarming. Whatever success we had trying to uphold a peaceful form of statecraft has eroded.

The young politician

Periodically, a young politician finds himself in contempt of something or other in the parliament and we get to watch as he is kicked out by security guards who use too much force and evidently relish their jobs. Why this thuggery in the people’s House? When our sacred institutions full of pomp and circumstance are thus desecrated, isn’t that an insult and a humiliation of the entire body politic?

And then there is the routine “questioning” and incarceration of, again, young politicians. Look, of course they are irritating. They are young and they are brash and sometimes what comes out of their mouths is astounding... but none of these things is a criminal offence.

Don’t the police already have their work cut out for them preventing actual crimes from happening? I could think of any number of things they should prioritise over politicians, such as making sure that cases of child abuse and battery are drastically reduced because perpetrators actually suffer the full wrath of the law.

Let me end this by saying: This is not a “my government should” article. It is a “we the people should check ourselves” appeal. Our lack of protest in public over how our opposition is being treated is alarming. The number of people who are cheering at their suffering is nauseating. Two decades of multiparty politics and hard work on the part of many citizens to drag our polity out of the armpit of the one-party state was no mean feat.

We need our opposition now more than ever, we need them as healthy, loud, diverse and resistant to state co-optation and oppression as possible. Though it may not look like it, they are an important line of defence against African paternalistic totalitarianism – and if you don’t think we’re in danger of that, my fellow Tanzanian, let’s have a polite public debate about why you’re wrong and should be on my side of this argument.

Elsie Eyakuze is an independent consultant and blogger for The Mikocheni Report.

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