Dar es Salaam, May 28 — Tanzania government on Tuesday this week summoned the acting U.S Ambassador, Inmi Patterson, to vent off its frustration over the embassy’s health advisories, which imply an increase of COVID-19 cases in the country.
In a series of rambling media statements, the U.S Department of State has repeatedly warned American citizens about “extremely high risk” of contracting COVID-19 in Tanzania’s largest commercial city, Dar es Salaam and other places.
The East African country has since April 29 stopped releasing new statistics on COVID-19 data after the government suspected possible sabotage to tarnish the image of the country.
In its recent health advisory, the U. S Embassy claimed there’s an exponential growth of Coronavirus cases in Dar es Salaam, adding that hospitals are overwhelmed with the COVID-19 patients.
However, during his meeting with the U.S top diplomat, the permanent secretary of Tanzania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and East Africa Cooperation, Wilbert Ibuge refuted the embassy’s claims saying they are misleading and likely to cause unnecessary distress to Tanzanian citizens and people wishing to visit the country.
Secretary Ibuge reminded the U.S diplomat on the importance of providing accurate, verified, and factual information from trusted sources.
This is not the first time the U.S Embassy provoked Tanzania. In June last year, it issued a travel advisory, warning an imminent terror attack that never happened.
Despite official secrecy on the status of the Coronavirus pandemic, the U.S embassy warned about exponential growth of COVID-19 cases, claiming hospitals in Tanzania’s largest city were overwhelmed with Coronavirus patients.
Data compiled by John Hopkins University, indicate that Tanzania has recorded 509 COVID-19 cases, including 21 deaths and 183 recoveries.
Unlike Kenya and Uganda, Tanzania did not impose lockdown but asked citizens to maintain social distance, wear facial masks and wash their hands
In a surprising move, the Dar es Salaam Regional Commissioner, Paul Makonda, last week declared victory over the Coronavirus—urging city residents to hold parties with loud music to cherish “God’s victory” against the virus.
“I call upon city residents to celebrate God’s victory, play loud music as much as you can,” the Regional commissioner said. President John Magufuli echoed the God factor in the fight against the Coronavirus.
Attending Sunday service at a chapel near his hometown recently, President Magufuli said: “There’s nothing like lockdown in Tanzania, God will help us,” amid cheers from a packed congregation.
Meanwhile, the president announced that Universities will reopen effectively June 1, adding that the situation is coming to normal due to substantial decline of COVID-19 cases.
The East African country has also lifted travel restrictions imposed on passenger flights to allow airlines and tourism business to return to normal.
The U.S Embassy’s health alerts came after growing rumors about suspected hidden deaths in Tanzania where amateur videos showed a number of mysterious nocturnal burials by mask-wearing officials.
As nations across East Africa administer testing and enforcing lockdowns, Tanzania has taken a series of counterintuitive steps in response to the crisis.
With no official lockdown imposed, businesses still open, and citizens continuing to stream in churches and mosques, observers say the number of people affected could be higher.
Tanzania’s response to COVID-19 has been characterized by conspiracy theories, tight control of information, and aversion to science.
In his most baffling response to the pandemic, President Magufuli, in early May announced that the Coronavirus data was inflated due to compromised test kits that resulted in false positives attributed to potential sabotage by imperialists.
When non-human samples including pawpaw and goat, tested positives, the president cast doubt on the test kits and the laboratory technologists.
Although the World Health Organisation (WHO) rejected the government narrative about defective test kits, the president ignored scientific reasons and embraced religious devotion and natural remedies as cure for the virus.
Observers say the country’s botched response to COVID-19 has significant health, economic and political consequences for the country and the rest of the region.
“High rates of transmission, coupled with the failure to implement containment strategy, will almost certainly fuel unexplained deaths,” said Elisha Osati, President of Tanzania Medical Association.
The United States and Tanzania, have for many decades been enjoying cordial diplomatic ties.
The existing partnership is characterized by mutual respect and aspirations for a peaceful and prosperous future.
The United States, through numerous presidential initiatives and U.S. agencies, has provided development assistance to Tanzania for capacity building to address health and education issues, encourage democratic governance, promote economic growth, and advance regional and domestic security.
Dar es Salaam — As part of its broader push for transparency and efficiency, Tanzania has launched a new digital platform that allows public leaders to declare their assets and liabilities.
The Online Declaration System (ODS) allows public leaders to fill in their wealth declaration forms digitally—removing the need for presenting them in person.
The Ethics Secretariat Commission is an independent agency under the President’s office entrusted, to monitor the ethical conduct of public leaders.
It receives, verifies declarations of assets and liabilities belonging to public leaders.
The new move comes as public leaders have been dragging their feet to comply with the Public Leadership Code of Ethics Act of 1995, which obliges them to declare their assets and liabilities to the Ethics Secretariat Commission at the end of each year.
According to the government, the ODS system is designed to cope with changes in science and technology in line with the country’s e-government policy encouraging officials to transact government’s business electronically.
Harold Nsekela, the public ethics commissioner-general told Ubuntu Times that the new electronic system simplifies communications and increases efficiency.
“Many leaders have been giving excuses for failure to submit their assets disclosures, with this new system I don’t see any reasons why they should fail to do so timely,” he said.
According to him, the new system has many advantages since it allows public leaders to fill in and submit the forms on an online platform wherever they may be, reduces printing costs and saves time.
He further said that the ODS system which conforms to legal and constitutional requirement will allow the government to gather the right statistics of public leaders in the country.
“We have had some problems in the past because even those in acting capacities had been filling the forms that is contrary to what the law says,” he said.
Stanslaus Mwita, Head of Information Communication and Technology at the secretariat told Ubuntu Times that the digitized system has been designed to eliminate the need for a physical walk to collect, fill in and return the forms, adding that it simplifies work and allows public leaders to return the form without delay.
According to the Public Leadership Code of Ethics Act, number 13 of 1995, the secretariat is directed to monitor ethical conduct and behavior of public leaders.
The law contains a key confidentiality clause on the declaration of assets, which gives the general public unlimited access to asset disclosure records but restrict them to publicly disclose the information seen.
Under section 9(1) of the existing law, every public leader is required, at the end of each term of office to submit to the commissioner written declaration of all property or assets owned by, or liabilities owed to him, his spouse or unmarried minor children.
The law establishes a statutory basis for standards of public leaders’ ethics aimed at strengthening ethics, accountability, and transparency of political leaders.
In Tanzania, public leaders are expected to act in honesty, compassion, sobriety, and uphold the highest possible ethical conduct so that public confidence and trust in the integrity, objectivity, and impartiality of government can be enhanced.
According to the law, officials who fail to declare their assets are liable to a warning, demotion, suspension, dismissal.
However, analysts say public leaders who fail to declare ill-gotten wealth often go unpunished because the secretariat has no teeth, and the failure to declare assets is deeply rooted in institutional weakness.
Speaking with Ubuntu Times, Ali Hapi a Regional Commissioner in Iringa who has declared his assets and liabilities welcomed the move saying it will further enhance transparency and foster accountability.
“Transparency is crucial in increasing accountability, assets declaration forms should be easily accessible online for anyone to access at any time,” he said.
He observed that the existing law does not deter leaders from engaging in private business while in public office.
“The law should clearly state that no public official will engage in business while holding political responsibilities, this will prevent abuse of office,” he said.
MANYARA, TANZANIA — As you trek down a rocky terrain dotted with thorny shrubs, that form a rosette of gray-green leaves with sharp spines on the tips, you can have a rare glimpse of ancient bushmen preying on antelopes and collect wild fruits.
The Hadzabe
One of Africa’s remaining hunters-gatherers whose way of life is increasingly threatened by modernity live in a tangled jungle stretching on a wide expanse of land.
Armed with rudimentary bows and arrows, the Hadzabe, who live at Yaeda valley in Tanzania’s northern Manyara region, still live by hunting and gathering.
Equipped with a vast knowledge of plants and animals, the tribesmen have for years lived in harmony.
However, due to increasing human activities, their idyllic balance with nature is rapidly waning—thus forcing them to struggle to eke out a living.
Across Africa, developing countries are increasingly perceived as potential areas for large scale agricultural investments. Foreign companies often, take advantage of legal loopholes to take swathes of village land for investment purposes.
A group of women farmers working in the field in Manyara. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
As one of the developing countries, Tanzania has as such, attracted huge interest among foreign firms. In some cases, companies directly negotiate with village leaders to take collectively-owned land.
However, with the help from local charities and respective district authorities, indigenous groups and marginalized farming communities are now using innovative approaches to secure their land.
From Manyara in the north to Pawaga in the south to Kiteto in the east, indigenous communities, whose rights have for long been trampled on by powerful encroachers are being assisted to develop land-use planning and village by-laws to protect their land.
Through lobbying, advocacy, and participatory land-use planning, Ujamaa Community Resources Team (UCRT) — a local advocacy group, seeking to empower and uphold communities’ land rights, has secured 20,000 hectares of land for the Hadzabe.
“We have developed a land-use plan, and village by-laws with the aim to protect their way of life,” says Edward Loure, a land rights activist and founder of UCRT.
The advocacy group is working to map and secure 970,000 hectares of communal land in northern Tanzania to deter grabbers.
A large scale maize farmer in Mbulu, an example of investments on village land. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
While local communities and indigenous people collectively control more than half of the world’s land, they own about 10 percent legally, and less of it is registered and titled according to a study published in 2018 by World Resources Institute.
In Sub-Sahara Africa, the challenge is more pronounced as ethnic groups such as the Maasai, known for their distinctive nomadic lifestyle, are particularly vulnerable to land grabbing.
In the Longido district in the northern Arusha region, UCRT has also secured a huge chunk of communal land for the Maasai, recognized by their distended earlobes, colorful beads, and dazzling red shawls. They have been issued with a document called Customary Rights of Occupancy.
“This is a very important document, it recognize them as the rightful owners of the land,” says Loure.
According to him, the move has helped to ease recurring conflicts with rival groups.
Back in Yaeda, although the Hadzabe are resilient and quick to adapt to new situation, their livelihood is facing multiple challenges as their hunting grounds are being encroached on by powerful outsiders.
A local water engineer takes measurements at a site where a foreign investor is setting up a dam for irrigation. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
“I am very happy because we have a strong protection of our land,” says Loreiy Juma, a bushman.
As people, companies, and governments are jostling for natural resources, the customary tenure agreements that used to protect rural land rights are often being undermined, and communities across Tanzania are losing swathes of unregistered land to foreign firms, land rights campaigners say.
At Vilabwa village, Kisarawe district in Tanzania’s coast region local residents who use collectively-owned land for farming, woke up to a grim reality as corrupt village leaders in 2014, allegedly tried to allocate 1,500 hectares of the village land to YellowBiofuel, a Mauritius based company, that had expressed interest to grow energy crops.
As she cleared grass on her field to prepare for sowing, 58-year-old Hidaya Bulembo recalls six years ago, when, she saw some people erecting concrete slabs on the edge of her farm without consulting the villagers.
“I knew something fishy going on. When I alerted other villagers we knew that a portion of our village land was about to be grabbed by the investor without following due process,” she says.
Instead, the villagers went to Vilabwa’s Village Land and Adjudication Committee (VLAC), a local body that helps landowners demarcate their boundaries and mediates land conflicts.
Armed with relevant information, the villagers registered their land with the government. The deal flopped and they fully regained it. But a growing number of communities are taking a stand and formalizing their land rights.
“When the village land is documented, it brings a sense of security,” said Ali Khamis Mnyaa, chairman of the Vilabwa VLAC.
SKIRTING THE LAW
Although 80 percent of Tanzania’s population work in agriculture, only a quarter of the country’s 44 million hectares of arable land are being used, according to government figures.
All land in Tanzania is the property of the state. Under the Land Act, which covers about 30 percent of the land in the country, the government can grant someone the right to occupy a piece of land for up to 99 years.
The rest of Tanzania’s land falls under the Village Land Act, which recognizes customary tenure and allows communities to allocate and use land in accordance with tradition. Any transfer of land rights under customary tenure requires the approval of the entire community.
Companies looking to buy land in the country are required by law to go through the Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC), an independent government agency.
In order to protect communities’ rights, even the transfer of village land must be approved by the government and the process has to involve all members of the village, said Geoffrey Mwambe, TIC Executive Director.
But land rights advocates say companies often try to skirt the law, bypassing the TIC and colluding with local village leaders directly.
Vilabwa residents say when YellowBiofuel first failed to get hold of the land it wanted, company officials tried to convince village leaders to sell to them by promising to build new schools and health clinics.
While village leaders generally welcome investors and the potential benefits they bring including jobs, improved infrastructure, and investments in health and education systems, companies often fail to deliver once the sale is agreed, said Emmanuel Sulle from the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, a research institute in South Africa.
“Evidence indicates that during the implementation of large-scale investments, the rights of rural communities over land and natural resources are not respected,” he said.
YellowBiofuel did not respond to email sent to them.
COMPLEX AND CORRUPT
In its 2018 report titled ‘The Scramble for Land Rights,’ the World Resources Institute noted that as demand for food, fuel, and other natural resources grows, there is increasing competition for land.
Communities are rushing to secure legal documentation of their land rights before companies take it from under them, the report said.
But the land registration process in Tanzania is often cumbersome and often riddled with corruption and inefficiency according to Transparency International’s 2013 Global Corruption Barometer.
Although rural communities including farmers and pastoralists have for decades used swathes of land for growing crops and for keeping animals, most do not have any documented evidence to prove it belongs to them.
Without enough tenure or security, farmers are not only less likely to invest in their land but also become vulnerable to powerful outsiders who are believed to collude with corrupt village leaders to seize property.
To help them navigate the system, rural communities are teaming up with non-profit organizations focused on promoting rural land rights. Together, they mark out village and farm boundaries and formalize land-planning use. They use that information to apply for CCROs which, if granted, gives the villagers formal powers over the use of their land.
For Bulembo, the farmer in Vilabwa, the biggest benefit of getting one of those certificates is finally feeling that her land and her livelihood are safe.
“I feel confident because I know, going forward, nobody will ever try to take part of this land for his own selfish interests,” she said.
Lack of official documentation that proves ownership means that the rights of these indigenous people are oftentimes trampled on. Today indigenous groups have lost more than 150,000 hectares of rangelands in northern parts of Tanzania. As supply of available land in Tanzania dwindles, huge pressure is being exerted on areas controlled by the Maasai and the Hadzabe, thus triggering recurring conflicts with outsiders.
With a special dispensation in Tanzania’s Village Land Act of 1999, indigenous groups are actively being supported by local NGOs to have their community land rights recognized.
The NGOs including UCRT, have been actively involved in mapping the boundaries of communally-owned land and drawing up land-use planning.
A local agriculture expert Dickson Elia explains a point on better ways of growing maize at Ilula districts. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Although the country’s laws governing land acquisition indicate that companies should obtain land through Tanzania Investment Center (TIC) — a government agency tasked with investment promotions, local land experts say, there were cases where private companies negotiated directly with village leaders and finance village land use planning processes.
In cases where land transfers are facilitated by TIC, observers say the government often use archaic compensation standards, where original users, whose land appears to be within identified investment areas are unable to negotiate compensation offers.
While village leaders often welcome investors who come with mouth-watering promises such as providing employment, build infrastructures, health, education, and support for community projects, investors allegedly do not always fulfill such promises.
Considerable discrepancies between the national policy on local land use planning and the situation on the ground, create ambiguities that are prone to exploitation.
Sule said although Tanzania government backs the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, it has not yet sufficiently recognized and protected those rights in the country.
According to him, the resource rights, including land, of the indigenous people are at risk from incursions from farmers, herders due to surging demand for land entangled by historical and contemporary large-scale alienations for economic development, biodiversity conservation and the changing climate.
Despite those policy huddles, Sulle said the government, through the Ministry of Land and Human Settlements Development has expressed great interest in working with local non-governmental organization to secure the land belonging to indigenous groups.
LAND REGISTRATION
Local villagers and poor individuals often shoulder a huge burden when trying to obtain various documents and approvals in order to secure a certificate of village land and customary right of occupancy respectively.
“The process often stretches the limited resources allocated to districts, which have large backlogs of pending land applications,” Sulle stressed.
Determining village boundaries in resource-rich communities with valuable forests and other natural resources is often a recipe for disputes between villages with conflicting or inconsistent oral histories and customary land boundary markers requiring resolution.
A group of women farmers working in the field in Manyara. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
“These disputes can be challenging to resolve because they require significant time and monetary investments,” he said.
Such disputes often cause major delays for respective authorities to attempting to confirm survey maps from villages, thus further delay the formalization process.
In many cases villages or individuals use their limited funds to follow up and pay for the necessary costs to speed up their land formalization process.
“Communities have either received little compensation for their land allocated to investors most of them have either left such lands undeveloped or sold to new investors, and or have failed to fulfill their promises such as job creation and provision of social services most of which are unwritten,” Sulle said.
While formalization of the village land is key for securing community land, experts say it can expose communities to a complex set of dynamics including external agendas by powerful actors including the state, NGO’s and investors.
For example, in places where village lands are formalized to facilitate natural resources, such as establishing wildlife management area or large scale investment in agriculture, the interests of powerful actors are often prioritized against those of the local communities.
MANYARA, TANZANIA — As nations worldwide enforce strict lockdown to quell the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, Tanzania’s President John Magufuli, has advised people to use alternative remedies including steam therapy, he claimed can instantly kill the virus.
In his televised address to the Nation on Wednesday, President Magufuli said water vapor at 100-degree centigrade can obliterate the coronavirus infections entering the body through nasal passage and mouth.
“A virus is simply an oil fat that can dissolve by using soap, methylated alcohol or steam,” he said.
The East African country has seen a rapid increase of coronavirus cases in the past fortnight, a trend experts at World Health Organisation (WHO) partly attributed to the government’s sluggish approach to obey international medical recommendations on social gatherings.
According to official government statistics, the highly contagious disease has so far claimed the lives of 10 people and infected 284 others.
Although the country has suspended international flights, closed schools, and partly deterred social gatherings, places of worship, which attract thousands of congregants remain open and local residents go about their businesses unhindered.
In his remarks, President Magufuli, who was surrounded by heads of the country’s security organs said inhaling steam from boiled water infused with Neem or onions, can kill off viruses.
“I would like to call upon Tanzanians to use steam to combat this disease…water vapor at 100 degrees centigrade can dissolve the virus,” he said.
His remarks, however sharply contrasted with his Deputy Health Minister, Faustine Ndungulile, a medic by profession who publicly stated in April that steaming is dangerous.
Speaking on 13th April, in Dar es Salaam, Ndungulile said steaming is inappropriate and cannot kill the coronavirus.
“Let me tell you, steaming is not the right treatment, it cannot kill the coronavirus,” he was quoted by HabariLeo a state-owned newspaper as saying.
President Magufuli, however, instructed health experts to research on traditional steaming, which he said convincingly could bring relief to patients.
However, speaking on BBC Keith Neal, a specialist in the spread of infectious diseases at the University of Nottingham in the UK warned that inhaling water vapors at boiling point could be extremely dangerous to the patient’s body.
He pointed out hot steam getting into a human body in an attempt to kill the virus, can potentially inflict irreparable damage to the lungs.
Online facts compiled by Reuters Fact Check team, seen by Ubuntu Times suggest the assumption that inhalation of steam in hot water infused with ingredients, will kill the virus is false.
While it may ease symptoms such as congestion, steam inhalation also carries the risks of burn, reads the facts.
President Magufuli, who is a devout catholic, last month encouraged people to go to churches and mosques for prayers because a “satanic” virus can only be cured through prayers.
Amid cheers from the congregants of a chapel in his hometown northwest of Tanzania, the president said the deadly virus cannot survive in the bodies of the faithful when they receive a holy sacrament, prompting thousands of worshipers to throng in churches.
As Tanzania’s largest commercial city of Dar es Salaam, is increasingly becoming the epicenter of the deadly virus, President Magufuli vengefully dismissed the idea of locking it down, on the grounds that it will deter the country revenue since the city serves as a commercial hub for east and southern African countries.
“Some people are suggesting we lock down the city, it will never happen,” he said.
Critics, however, said his remarks hinges on a dangerous moral trade-off between saving lives and sustaining the economy.
“In fact, since I heard that speech, I am really very sad and disturbed,” says Fatma Karume a vocal critic of the President and the former President of Tanganyika Lawyers Association—an umbrella organization for lawyers.
Dar es Salaam, one of Africa’s fastest-growing cities, with a population of 6 million people, serves as a gateway to landlocked countries including Rwanda, Burundi, and Zambia.
ITUNDA, Tanzania — It is midday at Itunda, a tiny village in Tanzania’s southern highlands and Marietta Andrea* is perched awkwardly on a wooden stool, her protruding belly touching a make-shift stall as she briskly packs roasted groundnuts, encrusted with salt into thin polyethylene bags ready to sell.
“I’m just helping my mother. It is not something I would do if I was going to school,” says Andrea.
The 17-year-old girl, became pregnant and was expelled from school—crushing her future dreams. Andrea, who wanted to be a teacher, was lured by Bodaboda (motorcycle), who offered her free rides to school.
“He was just a friend, but when he started to give me gifts, I couldn’t resist the temptation,” Andrea tells Ubuntu Times.
Lack of comprehensive sex education means that Andrea blindly gave in to a sex predator who destroyed her future.
Once a hard-working student at Ilula Secondary School, Kilolo district, Iringa region, Andrea was yearning to become a teacher and help marginalized children in the impoverished village to get an education and succeed in life. Instead, she became pregnant thus her dreams melted away.
Distraught, Andrea, who’s heavily pregnant, is wobbling daily on a rugged terrain to the bustling market where her mother sells various consumer goods.
She is not alone. Many girls, who become pregnant are expelled from school every year.
Under the country’s 2002 policy, a student can be expelled from school if they commit an offense against morality.
“This is a bad policy. It blindly ignores the worsening plight of pregnant girls and young mothers” says Onesmo Ole Ngurumwa, a Dar es Salaam-based human rights defender.
A group of peer educators are singing and dancing as a way to send messages about the impact of teen pregnancies in Shinyanga region in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
In 2017 Tanzania President, John Magufuli entrenched this policy, when he publicly declared that girls who become pregnant should not be allowed to return to school.
“As long as I am president… no pregnant student will be allowed to return to school…After getting pregnant, you are done,” he stated.
Tanzania has one of highest adolescent pregnancy and birth rates in the world, with 21 percent of girls aged 15 to 19 having given birth, according to 2015/16 data by Tanzania Bureau of Statistics (TBS).
More than 55,000 schoolgirls in Tanzania have been expelled from schools over the last decade under this policy which blatantly ignores jarring realities that lead to pregnancies, campaigners said.
“If I get a chance to go back to school. I wouldn’t hesitate a moment. That’s would be the only way to realize my dreams,” says Andrea.
While Tanzania government has the duty to protect girls’ right to education and safeguard them from sexual exploitation, observers say, pregnant girls and young mothers are still treated with astounding contempt.
“I feel I am a laughing stock. Some people are scolding me while pointing an accusing finger,” says Andrea.
Teen pregnancy is the main factor forcing many girls in Iringa to drop out of school. This stark reality, badly affect young mothers and their babies.
Nestled on the plains of Udzungwa mountain ranges, the wind-swept Itunda village, is home to many HIV/AIDS orphans.
A young facilitator addresses young mothers in Shinyanga about engaging in alternative income-generating activities in Shinyanga region in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
In the neighboring Masukanzi village, a tall, bubbly 19-year-old Hanifa Mdette sits on a mat, stirring porridge ready to feeds her plump two-year-old son. A wide-eyed cat mews, as a plume of smoke wafts from a shaky kitchen.
Mdette, who dropped out of school in 2017 says her future is bleak.
“I don’t think I can get any good work without education,” she says.
At the center of the crisis, is an entrenched patriarchal system and deep-rooted Hehe traditions where underage pregnancies are considered a curse, pregnant girls are ostracized.
However, there’s a glimmer of hope for Andrea and other young mothers as the World Bank has injected new funding which will partly be spent to address their worsening plight.
As part of its initiative to revamp ailing education system in Tanzania, the World Bank has approved a whopping 500 million USD loan, part of which will be used to re-instate pregnant girls and young mothers who are kicked out of school.
The $500 million Secondary Education Quality Improvement Project (SEQUIP) will benefit 6.5 million students in public schools and establish stronger educational pathways for those out of a formal school system.
The project is designed to help adolescent children to transition to upper secondary education. It offers pregnant girls, young mothers, and other vulnerable girls the possibility to return to school.
Moved young mothers join the floor dancing during one of the education sessions in Shinyanga in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
While Tanzanian children deserve better education majority of girls miss the opportunity every year, says Mara Warwick, World Bank’s Country Director for Tanzania.
“This is an important step in addressing the challenges that Tanzania children face throughout their education,” she says.
Although Tanzania adopted Free Basic Education Policy in 2015, which helped increased primary school enrollment from 8.3 to 10.1 million by 2018, and raise secondary school enrollment to 2.2 million from 1.8 million, observers say the government has failed to improve quality of education and reduce drop-out rates.
“Tanzania is suffering from a learning crisis where children are not in school, or are in school but not learning,” said Jaime Saavedra, World Bank’s Global Director for Education.
Human Rights Watch, however, criticized the World Bank for “failure to use its leverage” and caved to Tanzania’s discriminatory ban and practices, undermining its own commitment to non-discrimination.
Schoolgirls in Tanzania are routinely subjected to mandatory pregnancy test and those found pregnant are permanently expelled.
“The World Bank should be working with governments to move education systems toward full inclusion and accommodation of all girls in public schools, including those who are pregnant or parents,” said Elin Martinez, senior children’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch in a statement.
Equality Now, an international charity that champions the rights of girls and women calls on the government to lift the discriminatory ban against school-going pregnant girls.
Joyce Ndalichako, Tanzania Minister for Education Science and Technology recently said that the government is committed to ensuring pregnant girls who drop out of school will be allowed to go back to public school.
“We wish to assure the general public and our partners that the government remains fully committed to seriously implement the SEQUIP project according to the project design and agreement made with the World Bank,” the Minister said in a statement.
A group of peer educators are singing and dancing as a way to send messages about the impact of teen pregnancies in Shinyanga region in 2014. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
This is the first time Tanzania officials publicly announced the girls who have “dropped out” of school, due to pregnancy and other reasons will be allowed to continue their education.
Girls’ rights activists, however, received this public statement with cautious optimism.
In an interview with Ubuntu Times, Judy Gitau, Africa Coordinator of Equality Now—a global charity campaigning for girls’ and women’s rights expressed cautious optimism on the government’s promise.
“This is the first positive declaration…in four years, if the government acts upon its promise,.. it will be a welcome first step towards pregnant adolescent girls finally realizing their rights to education,” she stressed.
“The government has been unequivocal in stating that pregnant girls will be barred from attending mainstream school, not just for duration of their pregnancy but for life,” said Gitau.
Under the World Bank-funded project, officials are striving to help all school drop-outs pursue their secondary education and halt the practice of expelling pregnant girls from public schools.
“The public notice comes hot on the heels of SEQUIP funds being released by the World Bank, which has declared publicly that it has been advocating for girls access to education,” says Gitau.
Local and international civil society groups, including Equality Now, have been calling, urging the World Bank to withhold the funds until Tanzania withdraw discriminatory policy barring pregnant schoolgirls from attending school.
“We surmise that there is a direct correlation between the World Bank, finally approving its $500 million loan… and the country’s Minister of education releasing a public notice citing the inclusion of pregnant girls in accessing education,” she said.
Campaigners say this discriminatory policy has affected thousands of girls who are denied the right to education for life.
“It should be noted that some of these girls are victims of sexual violence and child marriages” Gitau said adding “it is a reflection of Tanzania government’s failure to address the root cause of adolescent pregnancies”
Juliet Kilewo, a victim of child marriages, who dropped out of school because her father wanted to marry her off in December 2020, reacts to a cameraman. She was rescued by Women rights campaigners. Credit: Kizito Makoye / Ubuntu Times
Education is crucial for fighting poverty and has an impact on social and economic welfare of individuals and the society.
Denying teenage mothers the right to education, campaigners say is equal to gender discrimination which reduces girls’ life opportunities, making it harder to fight poverty.
Gitau urged Tanzania authorities to seriously solve adolescent pregnancies and other economic and sexual exploitation of women and girls.
“Efforts to eradicate violence against girls and women in Tanzania must be stepped up and laws against sexual violence need to be better enforced to ensure that offenders are punished,” she said.
She called upon the government to eliminate stigma and discrimination borne by pregnant girls and adolescent mothers along with survivors of sexual violence.
As the world is reeling on the brink of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gitau warned Tanzania authorities to protect adolescent girls who are at risk of sexual abuse and exploitation.
“The closure of schools and other safeguarding institutions, quarantine rules and the restriction of movement, and loss of income in families as a result of the severe economic downturn, are all factors that increase the vulnerability of girls,” she said.
*Names have been changed to protect identities of the girls
BUDALANGI April 5, 2020 — For 54-year-old Esther Anyango, who resides in Maduwa village nestled in the swampy Yala, an island within the Lake Victoria waters is not her choice.
“This time, the waters are too much to bear. This is different from the other floods,” she tells Ubuntu Times in an interview, speaking through a translator, referring to the ongoing flooding in Budalangi, a region that sits on the shores of Lake Victoria.
It has never been Anyango’s delight to endure floods that happen in her village almost every year. Those financially okay, she says, have relocated and established their new residences in much safe land, mostly Bunyala north.
A mother of six, Anyango’s family is one of hundreds displaced due to the ongoing flooding in Budalangi, which experts say is much due to rising water levels at Lake Victoria.
As of March 28, close to 500 families were reportedly affected by flooding, forcing them to seek refuge on safer raised grounds.
Of concern to Anyango and thousands of residents here is how they will balance having to practice self-distancing and handwashing using clean water or sanitizers, now that they have their homes submerged.
“Toilets have been submerged in floodwater. The water is now contaminated and soon, we are foreseeing a cholera outbreak and other water-borne diseases. To worsen it, families are forced to share single rooms in safer places,” Elijah Wanjala, a resident of Mabinju told Ubuntu Times in an interview.
In its Eastern Africa regional flood snapshot for November last year, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) said over 2.8 million people had been affected by the floods.
The floods, which came in the back of consecutive droughts triggered flooding and landslides across the region, destroying homes, infrastructure and livelihoods, and the risk of communicable diseases — including cholera.
In Kenya’s western region, as floodwaters stagnate, potential threats of a water-borne disease outbreak is imminent, threatening to jeopardize the government’s efforts in containing the spread of coronavirus pandemic.
A spot check at one of the trading centers saw businesses brought to a halt, with few remaining shops staring at a possible total closure as the floodwaters continue to occupy the surrounding.
Raphael Wanjala, a Member of Parliament for Budalangi constituency, told Ubuntu Times in a telephone interview that the ongoing floods are likely to complicate the government’s efforts to combat coronavirus spread.
A woman with her children is spotted outside her submerged homestead with few belongings. Ongoing floods have caused residents to flee to safer grounds in Budalangi. Credit: Robert Kibet / Ubuntu Times
“The flooding threatens to sink the people of Budalangi into deeper poverty. One of the biggest concerns will be managing overcrowding in safety camps where families affected by the raging floods seek refuge,” says Wanjala.
Plagued by heavy rain and flooding over the last few months, with the February flooding leaving 40 dead and 15,000 people displaced, Tanzanian authorities had to order at least 25,000 people to evacuate to safer grounds.
This was after Nyumba ya Mungu dam, located in Mwanga district in the northern Kilimanjaro region, showed signs of breaking due to rising water levels.
Last month, roads in and around the commercial capital, Dar es Salaam were closed due to heavy rains, with a bridge in Kilosa district on the important Morogoro-Dodoma highway collapsing.
A March report by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) indicates that torrential rains caused damage in Mutimbuzi and Kabezi communes in Burundi’s Bujumbura rural province and Nyanza-Lac in Makamba province resulting in two deaths and over 300 people displaced from their homes
Other provinces affected by the torrential rains in Burundi include Rumonge, Gitega and Ruyigi provinces.
The unusual torrential rainfall witnessed in most countries of the East African region within the last quarter of last year, were said to be primarily been driven by the positive Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD)-an irregular oscillation of sea surface temperatures in which the western Indian Ocean becomes alternately warmer (positive phase) and then colder (negative phase) than the eastern part of the ocean.
Budalangi in Kenya, currently witnessing floods is home to a multi-million Bunyala rice irrigation scheme, with fears emerging that continued flooding will disrupt jobs and food security given the timing of the floods which come at the time of planting season.
A child is seen sleeping outside a grass-thatched mud-walled house in Runyu village as Lake Victoria’s backflow water cause havoc in Budalangi constituency. Credit: Robert Kibet / Ubuntu Times
Leaders say the sudden rising water levels in Lake Victoria could have been occasioned by neighboring Ugandan government’s decision to let off water from its Jinja dam through Kiira and Nalubaale powers stations spillways into the River Nile.
For residents living in villages within the Yala swamp, accessing medical services is a tedious exercise, with the nearest health center located in Osieko, several miles away
“People here live by the mercies of God. For them to access medical care, they have to sail a boat far away. With floods causing havoc, the situation is worsened,” says Collins Ayango, a water and beverage consultant from the region, who is in the process of putting up water treatment and bottling plant, seeking to solve the problem of access to clean portable water for the region’s residents.
Uganda and Kenya are part of the countries that signed the 2010 Cooperative Framework Agreement that allows the development of projects along the Nile without approval from Egypt. Under the framework, the River Nile Basin Commission was established to act as a forum for co-operation and a clearinghouse for the planned measures that could cause any harm to other riparian states.
Collins Ayango told Ubuntu Times that lack of political goodwill in the implementation of infrastructural projects, including building reliable dykes on the River Nzoia that empties its water to Lake Victoria used to contribute to annual floods in Budalangi.
“Until when the World Bank funded construction of concrete dykes few years ago, residents used to witness fatal flooding. The ongoing floods look different from the past. It seems it is being caused by the lake’s backflow,” he says.
Some of the vastly affected areas in Budalangi include Osieko, Maduwa, Bukhuma, Bulwani, Iyanga, Rukala, Runyu, Bubamba. Others are Kholokhongo, Mabinju, Musoma, Rugunya, Omena Beach and Buongo villages.
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