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Tanzanian
president Jakaya Kikwete delivers a speech during a business meeting in New
Delhi on June 18, 2015. He leaves office in October. (AFP)
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Tanzania’s ruling party is selecting its presidential
candidate this week, with the winner expected to take the east African
country’s top job after the October elections.
With a weak and fractured
opposition, and President Jakaya Kikwete stepping down after his second and
final term, competition is stiff with 38 candidates vying to secure the ticket
of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party, in power since independence in
1961 at the Tanganyika African National Union (Tanu), before its rebranding as
CCM in 1964, and with two-thirds of seats in the assembly.
Kikwete, the CCM
chairman, has said he does not have a “favourite person”, but called on party
members to vote for a candidate who could stem corruption.
AFP report continues:
“Pick a person who is a
serious, competent and good leader to boost the country’s economic and social
development,” Kikwete told a rally on Monday.
Presidential,
parliamentary and local polls are due on October 25.
Frontrunners for the CCM
nomination include Vice-President Mohamed Bilal, Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda,
and former prime ministers Edward Lowassa and Frederick Sumaye.
Also in the lineup are
Justice Minister Asha-Rose Migiro, a former UN deputy secretary general and
ex-foreign minister, as well as current Foreign Minister Bernard Membe.
Charles Makongoro Nyerere,
son of founding president Julius Nyerere, as well as Ali Karume, the son of the
first president of Tanzania’s semi-autonomous Zanzibar archipelago, are also in
the race.
Most of the presidential
hopefuls have pledged to tackle poverty and fight corruption should they
win.
‘Democratic maturity’
“This is the first time
in the country’s history when dozens of aspirants are seeking nomination of CCM
to run for the top office - it is healthy and shows democratic maturity,” said
Benson Bana, a political scientist at the University of Dar es Salaam.
But he also called for
fair play.
“Aspirants should avoid
mudslinging and corrupt practices,” Bana said.
Top CCM officials will
this week select three candidates and party members will vote on their final
choice at a congress on July 12 and 13.
The party will also
select its candidate to run for president of Zanzibar, with incumbent Ali
Mohamed Shein hoping to secure a second and final five-year term.
Kikwete is scheduled to
dissolve parliament on Thursday to pave way for the October polls.
Tanzania, with over 50
million people, is east Africa’s most populous country, with economic growth of
more than seven percent, according to the World Bank.
Despite advances, the
country “remains very poor by regional and international standards”, the World
Bank says, with agriculture the key sector, providing a quarter of gross
domestic product, and employing three-quarters of the population.
The government has also
been criticized for failing to stamp out rampant corruption, and
conservationists also say the number of elephants being slaughtered for ivory
by poachers is among the highest anywhere on the continent.
Opposition politicians
have also started the process of seeking party nomination for the presidential
race.
Ibrahim Lipumba of the
Civic United Front (CUF) will be making his fifth attempt to become president
of Tanzania, having lost to Benjamin Mkapa in 1995 and 2000, and Kikwete in
2005 and 2010.
Some however believe the
opposition could do well in the polls.
The opposition said in
October it would present single candidates at all levels, something analyst
Nicodemus Minde from the International Law and Policy Institute (ILPI) said
could provide “tough opposition”.
“There is no doubt that CCM
remains an experienced grand old party, whose history and formation resonate
with the ideals of Tanzania as a nation,” Minde said, but noted the party had
been best by “corruption scandals and internal schisms.”
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