Bunge-Lenye-Meno-A-Parliament-with-Teeth-for-Tanzania-LAXNNAJ547

A Parliament with Teeth, for Tanzania
The one-size-fits-all formula of Structural Adjustment brought similar
results across much of sub-Saharan Africa. In the aftermath of its
liberalising economic agenda, a well-connected business elite has
prospered. The middle class is either expanding or, in many places,
emerging for the first time. Over the same period, most rural populations
have become steadily poorer. Small farmers remain dependent on a few
cash crops, their predicament exacerbated by state failure adequately to
subsidise key inputs such as fertiliser, then further compounded by the
abolition of state controls on marketing and exports. The deepening
hardships of rural life fostered a new underclass of migrants drawn to
the cash economy of the cities.
For goverments, the capacity of aid-dependent administrations to raise
and manage their own resources was sharply curtailed by currency
devaluations and reduced tariffs on trade. A substantial part of Africa’s
political class, confronted by new extremes of wealth and poverty,
believe this diminished fiefdom is evidence of a neo-liberal agenda to
roll back the boundaries of the state. Such allegations are often resented
by the architects of development policy in London, Paris and
Washington. In every conspiracy theory, they detect symptoms of a
more enduring problem: African economies remain burdened by
parasitic elites for whom any suggestion of more open or accountable
systems quickly becomes a threat to personal interests.
Inside the machine
Tanzania has been no exception to these wider trends, for better and for
worse. After some painful shocks, the economy is more robust. Gross
domestic product has been rising at more than 5% for almost a decade.
Inflation is under control. Foreign direct investment has targeted a
booming telecoms industry and a fledgling mining sector, although the
pace of industrialisation remains slow. Trade and integration, with the
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