APRM commends Tanzania's President's Delivery Bureau By The guardian reporter

The African Union governance assessment body-the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) Tanzania chapter has commended the government of Tanzania for establishing the President's Delivery Bureau (PDB) which will implement highly prioritized projects.

 

The statement was issued over the weekend by APRM Tanzania Executive Secretary, Rehema Twalib when addressing local and international media when marking the APRM Day in Dar es Salaam.

 

She noted that among the governance gaps identified in the APRM review of Tanzania is multiplicity of plans, policies and strategies as well as poor implementation.

President Jakaya Kikwete

 

“We strongly commend the government of Tanzania for filling that gap which the APRM review identified in 2009 report. We now believe that the Big Results Now initiative will stir our socio-economic transformation,” she said.

 

According to APRM Country Review Report no. 17 for Tanzania, the country was advised to strengthen the state’s capacity to implement policies and programmes by among other things recruit the required personnel and increasing budget allocations to key economic and social sectors.

 

On its responses attached to the report, the government of Tanzania affirmed the importance of enhancing its capacity to implement policies and programmes and cited that strategies towards addressing the gap have been outlined in the five year development plan 20111/2012-2015/2016.

 

Commitment to address identified governance gaps was re-emphasized by President Jakaya Kikwete when addressing the rest of African heads of state and government participating in the APRM in a forum held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in January last year.

 

“We endorse APRM process as a value addition to our existing governance architecture. The government welcomes the observations in the Country Review Report (CRR) as objective and candid. Tanzania is ready to work on the identified challenges by funding the prepared National Programme of Action (NPoA),” he said.

 

APRM is mandated to periodically review progress on good governance through wide consultations of the people at the national level and then a country is finally reviewed by its peers-the rest of the African heads of state and government for constructive discussions on how to move ahead.

 

Tanzania signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to join the APRM process on May 26, 2004 and secured formal admission into the process on July 8, 2004. On the February 1, 2005 the Tanzanian Parliament ratified the APRM Memorandum of Understanding.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN