PUBLIC SERVICE MANAGEMENT CELEBRATIONS IN TANZANIA

Tanzania’s National Service Cultural Troupe (Known as JKT cultural troupe) entertained the audience in the ground

Another local dancing group was also there entertaining the audience.

Mr. George Ambeshi delivering his speech as a Vote of Thanks on behalf of the Chief Secretary and Head of Public service of the host Tanzania government.




The Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism pavilion of the wildlife division was among the most attractive pavilions. Here an exhibitor is showing to a visitor how staffed heads of wild animals are made. This is a staffed head of a buffalo.


Together with these resolutions, they adopted an Africa Public Service Charter, whose aim was to set standards that would restore prestige and dignity to the public service, and raise performance levels and competence in governments. The principles embodied in the Charter are compatible with the Batho Pele approach as well as other key Government transformation objectives and priorities. Other previous conferences were held as follows:- The first conference was held in Tangiers, Algeria in 1994, The second was held in Rabat, Morocco in 1996, whereas the third in Namibia. The fourth conference was held in Stellenbosch in South Africa in 2003, the fifth conference was held in Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia in 2005 and the sixth conference was held in Johannesburg in 2007. Africa Public Service Day is the day on which Africa as a whole honours all the many women and men whose responsibility it is to serve the people of Africa. It is an important day on the calendar and one people observes.
THE PURPOSE OF AFRICA PUBLIC SERVICE DAY:
This is to bring public servants together to commemorate the value and virtue of service delivery improvement to the communities they serve. To consider the working conditions of men and women who devote most of their lives to serve the public in order to encourage positive interests by citizens in the work of public administration. This is in a bid to create good initiatives, and promote professionalism.

PUBLIC SERVICE MANAGEMENT CELEBRATIONS IN TANZANIA

A man passes close to the pavilion of the Vice-President’s office that is responsible for the Union between Tanganyika and Zanzibar, the pavilion was decorated with portraits of former Presidents of the two countries, the late Mwalimu Julius Nyerere and Sheik Abeid Aman Karume who took to architect the union articles in 1964.

A series of the Ministers of Home Affairs in array since independence. There have had been 20 Ministers of Home Affairs in Tanzania since independence including the current Dr. Laurence Marsha.







WHAT IS THE AFRICA PUBLIC SERVICE CHARTER?
The Charter defines a framework to guide the public services in Africa in taking such legislative, regulatory, technical and practical measures as may be required to create favourable conditions for the proper functioning of the public service and improve the quality of its services. It states and defines the principles and rules of conduct for public service employees, who shall foster a neutral and stable conducive environment to the strengthening of ethical values and the image of the public service, as well as the professionalism of its employees.

PUBLIC SERVICE MANAGEMENT CELEBRATIONS IN TANZANIA

An exhibitor giving explanation to the visitor at the National Housing Building Research Agency’s pavilion (NHBRA)




Students from Agape Mbagala secondary school in Temeke district, Dar es Salaam region contributed a total of Tshs. 330,000 to an organization dealing with the helping of the disabled children in the country. At the organization’s pavilion, I managed to capture the Chairman of the organization Mr. Charles Mapima when receiving the money. According to him, his organization targets to collect a total of Tshs. 800 million (About US$ 650,000).



A woman with visionary disability using a typewriter machine, she is a teacher at Uhuru mixed primary school in Dar es Salaam, this is government school for disabled children. She was brought at the exhibition by the ministry of education at their pavilion to demonstrate how she undergoes her typing skills while her both eyes cannot see totally. It was a wonderful experience to visitors most of whom were perplexed to see her performing her typing skills without missing a word.
These principles and rules of conduct are Equality of Treatment of citizens, Neutrality in service delivery along the objectives of the government of the day, Legality in terms of administrative decisions conforming to laws and regulations, Continuity in terms of ongoing service delivery to customers, Proximity and Accessibility of services, Participation, Consultation and mediation, Quality, effectiveness and efficiency, Evaluation of services, Transparency and Information speed and responsiveness, and Reliability and confidentiality of information concerning citizens . The relations between the public service administration and its employees shall be based on professional merit and respect for human rights. Each public service must also see to the career development prospects of public service employees while ensuring the development of human resources and their self-fulfillments.

PUBLIC SERVICE MANAGEMENT CELEBRATIONS IN TANZANIA

Visitors at the pavilion of the department of the Information Services, a division of the Ministry of Information looking at the old photographs of the national events that took place way back in late sixties and early seventies.

Among the photos that impressed the onlookers was that one of the former Ugandan military President, General Iddi Amin Dadaa who was met by President Julius Nyerere of Tanzania at the airport in one of the East African Community meetings in Arusha. (I presume we could never meet, probably one of the leaders told the other. The two Presidents had a long standing grudge that led to the collapse of the community in 1977 with President Nyerere who declared he could not tolerate to share the same table with Amin). Amin was deposed by Tanzanian forces in a war after he had annexed part of her territorial integrity and claimed to be part of Uganda in 1979 an aspect that forced him to seek for a refuge in Saudi Arabia where he died in 2003. President Nyerere died in 1999 at Saint Thomas Hospital in London due to an illness.

This is when the third Tanzanian Prime Minister, the late Edward Moringe Sokoine (aged 39) was taking an oath of the office on 8th February 1977. He is being sworn in by President Nyerere as the third Prime Minister of the country.





These must be reflected in Recruitment and promotion, Mobility and redeployment, Staff training and development , Motivation of staff, Remuneration and Physical safety, working conditions and security of tenure. The fundamental values of a public service employee shall also be based on a public service rooted in professionalism and ethics. The rules of conduct for public service employees shall be part of an integrated anti-corruption system. The Charter also expresses the will of African States and underscores their political and moral commitment to improve the services provided to citizens and ensure the efficient use of the resources allocated for such services.

Tanzanian government to lower costs for ICT services

TANZANIAN government is working on the ways to lower costs of its ICT services operating in the country so as to allow more people have an access to the services countrywide. Tanzania’s Director General of its National Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) Professor John Mkoma, said recently that, the move follows the realization of the fact that many people who are within coverage areas of ICT s are still not served by the ICT s due to high costs of services. According to him, Tanzania has exponential growth in the use of ICTs especially in computers, radio. Television and more recently mobile phones with a Tele-density of over 33 percent, this is equivalent to 13 million SIM cards to approximately 40 million population of total Tanzanians. Internet use has increased to about 5 percent of the population, thus the challenges of the government is to ensure equitable access to ICTs to all areas. Following the proliferation of ICT tools in the country, this has a positive impact on the country’s economy. ICTs has facilitators of economic activities and also ICT as a sector by itself has been enjoying high growth.

Professor John Nkoma addressing a press conference in one of the past meetings in his office in Dar es Salaam.

According to the Minister for Communications, Science and Technology, Professor Peter Msolla, Tanzania’s government will establish ways to ICT services that go hand in hand with children protection. Professor Msalla has urged stakeholders in the ICT industry in the country to take the challenge as soon as is practically possible, especially internet cafes where children frequent, sometimes unaccompanied by adults. According to him, the government would like the private sector to support initiatives which will compliment its efforts in making ICT more accessible to children but making sure they are protected against being pulled towards cyber crimes. In his message to mark the International ICT Day in May 2009, the Director General of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Dr. Hamadoun .I. Toure noted that ICT stakeholders have to create a global network in order to protect children on line by enacting national legislation, strengthening capacity building , increasing public awareness and improving national cyber responsiveness.

Professor Peter Msolla delivering a speech in one of the International meetings abroad.

He stated that, the world can create a universally accessible information society where human dignity is respected and where everyone especially children can benefit from the opportunities accorded by ICTs to attain higher levels of development. ITU day was celebrated with this year’s event in the knowledge that stakeholders have set forth a strong momentum to make cyberspace a sage place for children where every child can harness the full potential of ICTs, and where every citizen on this planet can exercise the right to access, use, create and share information.

ICT education project amid rural connectivity challenges

LIKE most developing countries, the Tanzanian rural masses lacks satisfactory social services. For rural connectivity to make a difference in the community, it must be hinged on a social sector that touches on the lives and provide content that is relevant, cost effective and essential to the livelihood of the community. Education is one of the essential social services in rural Tanzania, which is deprived of quality infrastructure, human and financial resources. For instance many rural schools lack tap water, electricity and basic telephone connections. This impedes the teacher and student’s passion to utilize modern technologies necessary in teaching or for practical lessons. The modern Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are among the essential tools that most school administrations hesitate to acquire due to lack of electricity and telephone or high costs of connection. When the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training announced its projects to adopt ICT as a teaching tool and compulsory subject in all secondary schools, there was no comprehensive study done to verify its practicability despite its accessibility by stakeholders in the education sector. The decision came after a series of stakeholder workshops and the last one was held in January 2005 in which participants strategize on implementation modality. The Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) has already provided some funds towards implementation of the ;project. A recent workshop on titled ”Rural Access Points and Connectivity which was hosted by Share With Other People Network (SWOPNET) and supported by International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD) held in Dar es Salaam to deliberate on successes and challenges of rural connectivity in Tanzania. The workshop unveiled that practical implementation of the ICT education project in Tanzania is more complex than it was earlier anticipated due to rural connectivity challenges.

Sengerema Tele-Centre, the biggest in East and Central Africa. It is located in Sengerema district in Mwanza region. The centre was established by help of IICD since 2001 and has been providing ICT services to the people of lake zone region.

About half of the 2000 government-registered secondary schools in Tanzania are in rural areas with feeble communication infrastructure. There was a need for a paradigm shift in the provision of ICT services and especially so, connectivity in rural areas. ICT stakeholders who focuses on rural area need to develop connectivity models that are people centered and relevant to those communities. The government’s commitment to the establishment of rural Tele-centres is one of the ways and part of the government’s effort to help the rural poor and other underserved segments of the population to have access to ICT. By so doing the government aimed at empowering them to meaningfully participate in the current era of globalization and knowledge-based economy, in spite of the fact that, high costs of rural connectivity. This has become a synonymous challenge as costs of internet connectivity and bandwidth which has been an impediment to the progress of many ICT projects in rural areas in developing world. The best option to reduce cost burden is for users to share connection technologies whenever possible. A model if sharing connectivity from rural community centres is an option. As far as the Tanzanian ICT education is concerned, the project managers can pick a vivid practical experiences from normal operation of Tele-centers in rural areas of Tanzania. Rural Tele-centers of Sengerema in Mwanza, Dakawa in Morogoro, Ngara Lokole in Kagera, Kasulu in Kigoma and Lunga-Lugoba in Coast region as learning examples in Tanzania.

A SWOPnet trainer in a training session in Mwanza region. IICD has been sponsoring such training in collaboration of SWOPnet (Share With Other People Network), an organization based in Mwanza city in northern Tanzania. SWOPnet trainings helps to empower individual groups, civil organizations and government institutions in various aspects of ICT knowledge. (Photo by the courtesy of SWOPMET website)

Development partners kike the IICD have contributed in the establishment of these Tele-centers and that Tanzania is among 20 African countries set to gain from the community Tele-centre project of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). Currently the Tanzania Telecommunication Company (TTCL) operates a national wide internet backbone covering 21 regional administrative headquarters of Tanzania mainland and some administrative district centers. TTCL is also rolling out CDMA technology and many other data operators are also extending their VSAT connectivity services and cost effective solutions to remote district. ICT project cannot be stalled due to feeble or total lack of cost effective rural connectivity in Tanzania.

A visit to Ruaha National Park, now the largest in Tanzania

I had never dreamt of visiting a national park in my life, because I thought it was too expensive and unaffordable for an ordinary man like me. Most Tanzanians also think that it’s time wasteful as well time consuming just to spend a fraction of their money to see wild animals in national parks. According to such thoughts by many, these parks were established for a certain minority groups of people such as the Europeans who are considered to be the most well off.


Tourists coming out of game warder’s both at the entrance to Ruaha national park after having registered themselves.

A sign post at the gate with instructions to visitors.

After paying the entrance fees, game warders at the gate opens the gate to allow visitors’ vehicles to enter the park zone that confronts the banks of the great Ruaha river.

Three thatched huts on which sometimes visitors rests while viewing the flow of water at the banks of great Ruaha river seen infront.

People must understand that they have the wrong notion in their mind and are totally mistaken for that. The entrance fees to national parks or to most tourist destination centres charged in the country is more cheaper than one could imagine. It’s actually more affordable to local citizens rather than foreigners who pays much higher in variation depending on a particular tourist site to be visited, but it’s about twenty times the actual amount paid in total compared to the rates charged for local citizens.