CCM party unveils its manifesto, leaves the opposition fiddling with theirs

The ruling party CCM has unveiled its election manifesto, which highlights education, energy, jobs, infrastructure and communication as the priority for the 2015-2020 period should it win the October election.

The opposition coalition was expected to launch its manifesto this weekend but it is understood that discussions have been ongoing among the Ukawa alliance partners to agree on the mutual manifesto.

Chadema had already prepared its manifesto but it will be improved to align it with the ideas of coalition partners.

However, the CCM manifesto says the government formed by the party would ensure the primary education enrolment rate is increased from the current 80 per cent to 95 per cent by 2020.

It further aims at increasing secondary education enrolment from 60 per cent to 80 per cent in 2020, when another election is to be held.

According to the manifesto, the government formed by the CCM government will increase student-to-book ratio at primary education level from the current 1:3 to 1:1 by 2020.

It further says a teachers commission, which will be responsible for supervising development and teachers’ remuneration, will be established.

Despite the increasing enrolment rate in primary school, critics have maintained that the quality of education in public primary schools is poor, with the increase in enrolment not matching with the hiring of teachers and the building of sub-standard classrooms.

 On communications, the manifesto says the sector is one of the fastest-growing and a CCM government will ensure that the number of Internet users increases from the current nine million to 20 million by 2020.

The ruling party says that its next government will increase electricity connection levels from 36 per cent to 60 per cent by 2020. It will further implement new power projects involving neighbouring countries — including Kenya, Zambia, Rwanda, Burundi and Ethiopia.

On the roads, the party says it has built 13,753 kilometres of road in the past 10 years and it plans to build more roads if it is elected.

In 2010, CCM promised to strengthen the Tanzania Road Fund and widen its funding sources to enable it to construct bridges and renovate existing ones and to allocate road development funds for urban roads in Dar es Salaam, Arusha and Mwanza.

Most of the feeder and main roads have been built but quality of the infrastructure has raised questions. Most roads have collapsed soon after they were built.

Energy and education

During the five years of implementation of the 2010-2015 manifesto, the party will instruct the government to increase electricity production from 1,051MW to 1,722MW by improving policy, laws and regulations guiding the energy sector in the country, as well as connecting the national grid to other countries so as to boost energy security in the country.

However, Tanzania Electricity Supply Company Ltd (Tanesco) has performed poorly in the past five years.

Despite total grants and subsidies having declined to Tsh237.2 billion ($131 million) in 2012 from Tsh406.8 billion ($226 million) in 2011 and reached less than Tsh170 billion ($94 million) in 2013, the energy body has not been able to run its business profitably.

Despite the opposition’s manifesto not being ready, Chadema chairman Freeman Mbowe has been quoted in the media on several occasions as saying that the party’s priority is education, because its membership believed the poor quality of education offered in Tanzania negatively affects all the sectors in the country.