Browsing: Magufuli

As the number of new coronavirus infections reaches 53, the government of Tanzania has ordered schools to stay closed indefinitely, evidence of the uncertainty that haunts these murky coronavirus times.

It is the crowded commercial port city of Dar es Salaam that is most affected, in fact all the  53 new Covid-19 reported cases are in the city of 6 million plus people.

There are 4 new cases since the last new infection was reported on Monday making it 4 new cases in just 3 days, that is a rate of almost one new infection per day this week.

The development comes inspight of all precautionary measures that the city has taken including having hand sanitizers in every store, government office, market place and even public transport vehicles.

Union & Labour Day cancelled days from annual celebrations

With the exponential increase in rate of infections, and the spicy Islands …

The economic impact of fake and substandard oil on the global economy is valued in the billions of dollars. The business is tempting, it has cheap overhead and high profits and so the black market for fake goods is growing .

The counterfeits black market affects all types of good, from food products to toys, to cosmetics to jet fuels, you name it, it has a counterfeit.

In Kenya, millions of litres of crude oil has been barred from entering the country via an oil tanker on April Fools. News of the cargo ship, No. K07/2020 has just been released to local media saying was the oil tanker, MT Ocean Tiara belongs to a subsidiary company of a Nigerian oil giant and was seized after it berthed at Mombasa port waiting to moor and dump the fuel.

The tanker and its cargo have several discrepancies and the long arm of …

Tanzania is well on its way to achieving its long coveted middle income status, and the mushrooming skyscrapers in most all its major cities are evidence. Well that’s one way to look at it.

You see, where investment is on the raise, it is safe to say the economy is stable and even growing. That is Tanzania for you, a stable growing economy where investment, especially in the real estate sector is growing, and growing exponentially.

Tanzania has been enjoying a steady economic growth over the last few years averaging an impressive 7% annually. However, for the sake of this article, lets leave the data in the papers for now and take to the streets, on the ground, what is actually happening?

In major cities like the capital Dodoma, development is hands on, on the ground right in front of you. Empty stretches of land are now housing complexes complete …

The deadly coronavirus has brought the World to a standstill, spread through touch, African financial institutions are now going cashless to beat the virus.

The exchange of money, in cash, risky further spread of the virus, an obvious solution is to go cashless, use digital payments only. However is Africa ready?

In the face of this global tragedy, Africa’s fast digital penetration seems to have come in the nick of time. Led by the telecom companies, Africa leads the globe in use of mobile transactions.

Even in the most remotest corners of the continent, peasant farmers, pastoralists herding cows, all can be found with a mobile phone registered for mobile money transactions. Even the smallest shops accept mobile money payment for even the smallest purchases. The only limitation has always been the expensive cost of the service, however that cost is irrelevant if the money is not withdrawn to cash.…

In the backdrop of Tanzania’s Central Bank announcing a stimulus package for commercial banks, loans advanced by banks have shot up significantly over the last year and the stimulus package is expected to sustain if not increase lending.

The Central Bank, the Bank of Tanzania (BoT) has this week released its Consolidated Zonal Economic Performance Report which shows lending by commercial banks have increased considerably in the last year.

The report shows that the highest amount of growth in bank loans was parallel to ongoing national infrastructure development works. The highest increase in loans was to companies operating in the central and south eastern zones owing to increased construction projects and to trading activities, respectively.

This would explain reduced lending in the commercial capital of Dar es Salaam. Lending in the bustling port city actually fell 1.6 percent compared to the same period last year.  However, despite the percentage decrease, …

Tanzania’s Controller and Auditor General (CAG) has unveiled the country’s Local Government Authorities (LGA) have been involved in the embezzlement of millions of dollars issued to fund nonexistent projects.

Reporting to the country’s President John Magufuli, the CAG’s report indicated that LGA’s across the country have been corruptly siphoning tax payers money for individual gain. The 2018/19 report shows what can only be described as gross mismanagement of public funds.

In the report, Tanzania’s CAG Mr Charles Kichere also reported the gross misuse of funds in excess of USD 342.2 million by the country’s Local Government Authorities (LGA).

Worse still, while the LGAs collected more than USD 46.5 million in the said financial year, only 26.37bn/ was allocated to the rightfully designated development projects while the remaining 17.41bn/- was, according to the CAG report, misused.

Further still, another 10.39bn/- in local revenue that was collected by some 84 Local Government …

The Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) project, is a railway under construction in Tanzania which was seeded in 2016, linking the country’s strategic regions and neighboring countries including, Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the anticipated project with the line length of approximately 1,800 kilometers, intends to revolutionize mobility and distribution of commodities in Tanzania, through replacing the ineffective meter-gauge railway system.

The Turkish (Yapi Merkez)  contractor, is on the clock to bring to life the awaited transportation machine that, might transform Tanzania’s economy (for starters; production, labor supply, and consumption). Tanzania Railway Corporation (TRC), the state-owned railway company, oversees a strategic railway network of 2,561 kilometers length, of which is a 112-year-old German colonial transportation remnant. Running from Dar es Salaam (nation’s
business hub) to Kigoma, then having a north-south connection Korogwe to Ruvu. More than USD 1.2 billion has been attached to the project, which …