Dar es Salaam — When it comes to self-serving antics, no one beats MPs, who demonstrated exactly that in Dodoma on Wednesday.
Never in the business of missing make-up and re branding opportunities, the MPs sought to get a cake of the current wind of patriotism sweeping across the country over President John Magufuli’s standup against mining giant, Acacia.
The public watched and listened yesterday as the august House endorsed a motion to congratulate President Magufuli for his bold steps to push for the country’s better bidding in the mining agreements.
The motion was moved, debated and passed in the usual manner, with the majority of the ruling party MPs cheering it through while the opposition pulled the other way.
But to many independent analysts, it will not be lost that however well intended the motion was, it was in the same fashion, and in Parliament arrangement that politicians endorsed the same laws that President Magufuli is seeking to reverse. Some of the politicians have lived through the motions over the years as the people’s representatives.
It will therefore not be surprising that yesterday’s decision to side with President Magufuli to clear rot in the mining sector that has cost the nation billions of shilling in loses is likely to raise questions as to the sincerity of the institution to serve public interest that outlives individual and party selfish interests.
Apart from endorsing the motion, the MPs also called for stern action against officials implicated in mishandling mining contracts and administrative faults that cost the nation.
The passing of the mining laws by the CCM-dominated parliament some 20 years ago is blamed for giving foreign mining companies a leeway to unfairly exploit the country’s mineral wealth.
The subsequent actions by the lawmakers to turn down any efforts from within and outside Parliament to overhaul the mining regime over the years will certainly call to question their new-found commitment.
Observers yesterday’s resolution in one way or another exposes their collective failure to stand for matters of national interest for many years.
Questions abound why some individuals who crafted and enacted exploitative mining laws and punished fellow MPs who ceaselessly called for their review now put up a brave face.
“Parliament’s decision to pass a motion to support the president’s stance smacks of hypocrisy,” said the acting Director of Legal Human Rights Commission (LHRC), Ms Anna Henga, likening the MPs to a flag which blows with the wind.
She said this was not the first time such an investigation was done on minerals, citing a 2014 LHRC report on the same which was submitted to Parliament but was not take seriously.
CCM’s Ideology and Publicity, Mr Humphrey Polepole, yesterday said he would not comment on reactions by the MPs, saying the real story was on the meeting that President Magufuli held yesterday with the Barrick Gold boss.
“Today (yesterday) President Magufuli met with Prof John Thornton, Chairman of Barrick Gold Canada, which is the largest shareholder of Acacia Mining. The firm has pledged to compensate the nation and build a smelter. To me, that is the greatest news for the nation,” he said.
He said 275 MPs from CCM who forms 60 per cent of MPs in the current Parliament are new representatives and were not in Parliament when the bad laws were being passed. “The fact that the mining company has agreed to compensate Tanzania the loss that it incurred for the past years is something historic in Tanzania,” he said.
Tanzanians recall the rush in 1997 in Parliament to pass the mineral sector laws that become enormously favourable to foreign mining companies.
The laws provided incentive and exemption like income tax, valued added tax, fuel levy and customs duty for mining companies and their contractors.
At that time, MPs waste no time to scrutinize the laws that allowed 100 per cent ownership of minerals and mines to foreign corporations, effectively barring the government from entering into new joint ventures. The laws also granted that they could repatriate all their profit.
Parliament suppress own voice
The most vivid example of substantive weakness of Parliament as an institution to effectively serve the public interest was the its decision in August 2007 to suspend opposition parliamentarian Zitto Kabwe after he proposed a government investigation into the signing of anew mining agreement without parliament’s role.
The CCM-dominated MPs unanimously rejected Zitto Kabwe’s call which culminated into his suspension for several months. Numerous other such efforts in the House were either defeated on the floor or killed beforehand the MPs.
In July 2015, about 32 opposition MPs were ejected from the August House following protests against the rush by the government to table three crucial bills on oil and gas. The opposition and other group outside the assembly wanted the tabling shelved until after the 2015 elections.
The opposition accused Speaker of the national assembly of abusing power, saying they were not ready to take part in a flawed process that would set the nation on the path to a resource curse.
MPs turn deaf ear on commission
The government has from time to time bowed to public pressure and formed several commissions to probe loopholes in the mining regime and proposed ways of ensuring Tanzania fully benefit from her mineral wealth. Not less than 10 commissions and committees have been formed in the past but whose outcomes were largely shelved.
The Bomani commission that was formed by President Jakaya Kikwete was by far the deepest of all and recommended sweeping changes to turn around the sector.
However, Parliament is accused of failing to take opportunity from the work of those commissions to pressure government for the desired changes in mining laws. It is the same government that repeatedly refused to make mining agreements public to elected representatives that the MPs are celebrating its actions.