Per IPPMEDIA. President Jakaya Kikwete yesterday bid Members of Parliament
farewell, insisting that he will assent to the just-endorsed contentious
petrol and gas bills.
In his speech to the legislators, the Head of State said the 10th
Parliament will be officially dissolved on August 20th, when it is
announced in the government gazette.
He applauded the MPs for the job well done on the bills. He said the bills were of great importance will assent them.
“You have done an amazing job to oversee the government performance
and make laws…I sincerely thank you for passing the petrol and gas
bills. I promise to assent them into laws as soon as they are brought to
my office,” said Kikwete.
According to the President, issues of oil and gas are among the
hitches of the Union but his government has succeeded to resolve it. He
said petrol and gas matters are not included in the endorsed bills.
He said with the new bills Zanzibar shall have autonomy to
independently manage exploration of gas, oil and revenues, the decision
he said was reached by governments of Tanzania mainland and Zanzibar.
The bills that were passed by the legislators early this week
include the Petroleum Bill 2015, Oil and Gas Revenue Management Bill,
2015 and the Tanzania Extractive Industry (Transparency and
accountability) Bill 2015.
The four other Union problems Kikwete said have been resolved
through the proposed constitution. “The referendum is expected to deal
with all the Union problems,” he said noting that when taking over the
country, the number of Union problems were 13.
Kikwete assured Tanzanians that the nation is secure with the
National Service being empowered with modern equipment and training. He
said the army had tightened security at all the border posts and along
the Indian Ocean.
He said the army and police had done big job to reduce the number
of crime incidences from 53,268 in between 2005/06 to 43,808 by the end
of last year.
He said the government was implementing several programmes to
improve the welfare of police and army officers whereas 20,000 houses
were being built countrywide.
On economic growth, the President noted that Tanzania is now ranked
7th among the 20th African countries with fast growing economy. He said
the national income had tripled from 14.1trn in 2005 to 79.4trn/- in
2014 while per capita income had also increased to 1,724,416/- per annum
by the year 2014 from 441, 030/- in 2005.
“The country’s exports have increased to USD 8.76 billion from USD
1.67 billion in 2005. With the 2010 - 2025 long term perspective
development plan Tanzania expects to become a middle income country in
next few years,” he affirmed.
President Kikwete said government revenues increased from 177bn/-
per month in 2005 to 850bn/- in 2014. The move he said helped the
government to increase the budget 13.4trn/- in 2005/06 to 22.49trn/- in
the 2015/16 fiscal year.
“With the successes on revenue collections we have been able to
reduce donor dependency on our budgets from 42 per cent to 15 per cent,”
he noted adding that revenue collections from non-tax revenues
specifically district councils and government departments were under the
target.
However, the President said in 10 years the number of Judges to the
Court of Appeal had increased to 16 from 8 and High Court judges from
37 to 81. He said the number of women judges at the Court of Appeal had
increased to 32 from the previous 5.
“Currently we have a total of 1, 266 resident magistrates at all
levels of the courts whereas among them, 534 is equivalent to 35 per
cent were women.”President Kikwete said.
He also explained that the number of women MPs had risen from 62 in
2005 to 127 saying the fifty/fifty ratio was likely to increase their
number. The ration has been suggested in the proposed constitution. He
said there were also 10 women ministers and 5 deputy ministers.
Earlier, in his speech, Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda announced the
establishment of a new region of Songwe and other new six districts,
municipals and 586 wards. He said the decision was due to increased
population.
The new districts are Ubungo, Kigamboni in Dar es Salaam, Kibiti
District in Coast Region and Malinyi District in Morogoro. Others are
Songwe District in Mbeya Region and Tanganyika District.
The new municipals Pinda said are Mbinga, Kasulu, Kahama, Geita,
Newala, Chalinze, Ifakara, Nyambamba, Bunda, Mbulu, Tunduma, Kondoa,
Masasi, Handeni, Mafinga, Kasulu, Kahama, Geita and Newala.
The new councils are Manyoni, Buchosa, Malinyi, Madaba, Mtibo,
Msembe, Mlele, Kakonko, Kerwa, Kyemba, Mbogwe, Uvinza, Nyangwale,
Butiama, Momba, Nyasa, Ushetu, Busega, Itilima, Msalala, Ikumi and
Mkalama.
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