Monday, February 20, 2012

Tazara workers demand salaries

   EAST AFRICAN BUSINESS WEEK

Tazara workers demand salaries


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DAR ES SALAAM, TANZANIA-  Former employees of the Tanzania -  Zambia Railways Authority (TAZARA) have not been paid their three months pensions since November last year.
 (The abandoned wagon at Tazara, workers have of recent months not been paid their three months wages Photo By Kenan Kalagho)

Officials from TAZARA confirmed that the Authority does not have money to pay the pensioners. 
"This issue is very sensitive because it involves the government of Zambia and that of Tanzania. There is no such money for now," said TAZARA Public Relations Manager Conrad Simuchile.
Mr Simuchile said the Chinese government has been rendering support to TAZARA but 'million of shillings' you usually hear are in form of equipment and training of experts in different capacities but TAZARA does not get cash from China.
He said TAZARA has been expecting new wagons from the Chinese but they have not yet arrived.
"We have been expecting new wagons out of that money from the Chinese government," he said. Probably the wagons will be in Dar es Salaam at the end of this month."
Speaking with the East African Business Week in Dar es Salaam last week, one of the former employees of TAZARA, Mr. Daudi Mbaga, said they were around 4,000 former employees whose pension salaries have not been remitted to their accounts.
He said last week their taxed funds were not being remitted to the National Insurance Company, a firm which deposits their pension salaries to Tanzania Postal Bank.
"I have worked in this company for my entire life in the production section till my retirement but my pension salaries were not being deposited to the National Insurance Company as we agreed with our employer, said Mr. Mbaga.
"Last week, we had a meeting with Mr Akashambatwa Lewanika (the firm managing director) to discuss our pension salaries' fate but he told us that the railway firm had no money to pay them," said Mr Mbaga.
Mr. Mbaga said; "Once we confronted him, he told us that he had no money to pay us and he will pay us once he gets the money."
An official from TAZARA who preferred anonymity said even the current workers were finding it hard to get salaries salaries.
"Just imagine we have been paid the December salaries in the first week of February and we are still not certain when our January salaries will be paid," the official said.
He said even the December salaries were borrowed from TAZARA Savings and Credit Corporative Society.
"The problem is that TAZARA can hardly transport goods.  We have a lot of goods in the depots of Kurasini, Yombo and Bandari in all depots located in Dar es Salaam awaiting to be transported but there are no wagons to transport them due to fuel shortage," the official said.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

East Africa Business Week

Land shortage dogging Tanzania housing corporation

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Muungano Saguya, is the  Corporate Social Responsibility Manager for National Housing Corporation (NHC). East African Business Week's Kenan Kalagho talked to him about the company achievements since its inception in 1962. Here are excerpts:

(Muungano Saguya the corporate Social Responsibility Manager with NHC.  Photo
QN: Tanzania is experiencing a massive shortage of housing and you recently introduced the mortgage finance system in partnership with seven local and regional commercial banks in the country.  How beneficial is this system to the local Tanzanian?
ANS: The government reinstated the system, that has led the National Housing Corporation to sign an MoU with  seven local and regional commercial banks including National Bank of Commerce, KCB, National Microfinance Bank, Exim Bank , Bank of Africa, Azania and Commercial Bank of Africa.
With this system, Tanzanians will get loans from these banks to buy new houses that will be constructed by the NHC.

QN: What role will the National Housing play to make sure that more Tanzanians own homes using the mortgage finance system?
ANS: The National Housing Corporation leads as the corporation that has been assigned by the government to provide good shelter for citizens. One of the aims is that the NHC constructs many houses to enable more Tanzanians own homes.

QN: What effects will this mortgage finance have to the economy of Tanzania and its citizen at large?
ANS:The  mortgage finance system is a forum through which many citizens will have access to loans from the banks and the positive effects on this is that it will boost production of the housing industry in the country and this will in turn reduce rental charges. This will mean that the economy will grow because people will have access of loans from banks and build houses for business and therefore generate revenue for the government through taxation.
This can also have a negative impact to the economy because the housing sector is a very fragile industry, which means that if a lot of money is borrowed from banks to finance construction and these constructed houses fail to attract more customers, that will mean that the borrowed money and its interest rates charged will fail to be remitted to the banks and this might lead to the economic crunch.

QN: Recently the National housing  have focused much on public-private partnership in as far as the construction of houses is concerned. Is this partnership open to all individuals willing to partner with the National Housing Corporation and what are the conditions for one to enter into this partnership?
ANS: We had this policy of public-private partnership since 1988 because we realized that the National Housing Corporation had no financial resources, but this policy was revised in 2008 and the joint venture activities were halted in 2010. This was in a bid to create a win-win situation because we realized that the National Housing was not being treated fairly in these policies. We are hoping that the policies will be revised this year and hopefully the private-public partnership will be reinstated in a more meaningful way that will benefit all the parties.

QN: There has been a negative perception about the National Housing failure to beat the growing demands of housing in the country, what expectations should the public have to the National Housing Corporation especially with the mortgage system in place?
ANS: This is true because the National housing Corporation was mandated to cater for the housing industry in Tanzania, however there were various hindrances that were holding back the growth of the national housing sector in the country like the issue where the national housing could not evict its tenants who fail to pay for their rents except with an order from the court. These laws and many others which have now been revised were a hindrance to us and for the past five years we have barely been able to construct less than 600 houses.

QN:  It is said that the construction industry contributes barely 0.3% to the national economy, is there any way of reversing this trend?
ANS: We still believe that the housing sector can play a great role in contributing to the GDP of this country because housing is a business, employment and can lead someone to get capital from different banks. We believe that if the government can play its part in this sector, it can contribute heavily to the national economy. However with the new system of mortgage finance that the National Housing Corporation have signed with different local and regional banks, we can be sure of realizing this dream.

QN: The National Housing Corporation strategic plan  (for 2010/2011-2014/2015) targets on constructing 10,000 houses for middle income earners and 5,000 for low income earners. Why should the target dwell much on middle income earners yet the housing demand is even worse for the low income earners?
ANS: People with low income need to have subsidy that means that the profit that will be obtained from the 10,000 houses that will be constructed for the middle income earners will be used to subsidize the low income earners and if the profit beats the margin then the number of houses to be constructed for the low income earners might also increase.

QN: The country celebrated 50 years of its independence in December.  What would you say are some of the challenges that you have faced during the period?
We have survived but face challenges like the scarcity of land. There has also been a negative mindset of most Tanzanians to see the National Housing Corporation houses being rented or sold at a low cost. This mindset needs to be reversed.

Food prices remain high on dry season regional demand

East African Business Week

Food prices remain high on dry season regional demand

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DAR ES SALAAM, TANZANIA - Food prices in Dar es Salaam continued to rise despite the end of the festive season.
A random survey made last week by East African Business Week at the city's main market of Kariakoo in Dar es Salaam, revealed that there has been a sharp increase in prices of food produce since the end of the festive season. The survey showed that the best rice, which during the just ended season was being sold at TShs 2,100 (US$1.35) a kilogramme was now hovering around TShs 2,500 (US$1.59) a kg, whereas the lower grade rice that was previously sold at TShs 1,900 (US$1.22) a kg is now selling at TShs 2,200(US$1.35) a kg.
A customer weighs his options at one of the markets in dar es Salaam. (Photo by Kenan Kalagho)A customer weighs his options at one of the markets in dar es Salaam. (Photo by Kenan Kalagho)
There has been an increase in prices of commodities such as beans, spices, maize flour, meat and other essentials.
The prices of beef at many Dar es Salaam  butcheries also have shot up from the previous TSh 6,000 (US$3.87) during the festive season to TShs7,000 (US$ 4.45) a kg where as in other places like Buguruni to the outskirts of the city the price of beef has relatively gone down to the previous TShs 5,000 (US$ 3.18) a kg.
The price of maize flour on the other hand has gone up from the previous TShs 800 (US$0.50) a kilo to TShs 1,200 (US$0.76).
Mr Hamisi Mzee, a trader at the Dar es Salaam Kariakoo main market says the prices of food are being driven mainly by the high costs of living in terms of house rent and fuel as well as the country's bad economic shape.
"The costs of fuel and transporting these produce to Dar es Salaam is expensive and this leads us to increase prices as well, says Mzee.  "Even in the houses we are staying in the rent has gone up so high so that you rarely find a room below TShs 30,000  (US$19.10) a month.”
Speaking in Dar es Salaam last week, the Minister of State in the Presidents office,  Civil Society Relations and Co-ordination, Mr Steven  Wassira, said the prices of food in Tanzania were  a result of the increased fuel prices and the cost involved in transporting them to their markets.
"The prices of fuel are very high and these produce needs to be transported from their place of produce to find customers in the cities" the minister said. He said Tanzanians should also know that neighbouring countries like Kenya, Sudan, and Somalia which have been experiencing long droughts have driven the prices of food in Tanzania as well.
Wassira said Tanzania should produce more food in order to get the surplus which will have a positive effect in reducing the escalating of food prices in the country.
"As much as we need investment in agriculture sector, we need to focus on providing  support to Tanzanians so that they move out from the hand hoe system of agriculture to a modern large farming technology which will allow them to produce more food for business benefits," Wassira said.
Wassira noted other challenges like poor infrastructure that hinder the produce from reaching the market. "Tanzania produces more food in Rukwa, Kagera and Kigoma but there are no good roads that connect such places so that food produce can be transported to Dar es Salaam and or across other regions of the country."