Mkapa orders government officers to enhance transparency

Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa called on government leaders on Tuesday to increase transparency and to avoid hindering the media's attempts to disseminate information to the public. At the same time, however, Mkapa urged the media to earn the respect of the government by improving ethics within the profession and raising the poor standards of reporting. Mkapa, a former journalist, was speaking during the opening of a two-day workshop on "Improving Public Communication of Government Policies and Enhancing Media Relations" in Bagamoyo, north of the commercial capital, Dar es Salaam. The UN Development Programme (UNDP) sponsored the workshop. "I see the task ahead of us as essentially one of improving our national capacity for good governance in the interest of the people," he said when he opened the workshop. "Transparency and accountability must now cease to be a condition [just] to be tolerated, but be perceived as a government's core function, to be cherished as party to a deepening culture of service to the people," he added. While announcing the appointment of communications officers in various government departments, he warned that "political leaders and executive heads" could not escape overall responsibility for improved communication, and demanded that government officers prove their commitment to transparency. "Each one of you needs a big change in attitude so as to recognise that you, and the government as a whole, are servants of the people, and that whatever you do, you are doing it in their name, with their money," he said. Referring to "those whose mind-set under the one-party political system ... considered communication to be the duty of the public to agree with them", Mkapa said that the move might "appal" some people. A media consultant and former journalist, Ferdinand Ruhinda, told the workshop that the poor flow of information stemmed from a traditional belief, which, he claimed, had been developed during the presidency of Julius Nyerere, that the president was the sole medium of communication. "Tanzanian government officials do not see it as an obligation to pass information to the people," Ruhinda said. "Ministers will often only hold a press conference when things have gone wrong. The government needs to develop the capacity to explain what it is doing." Mkapa, however, also urged the media to address its own problems, reduce ignorance and improve standards, ethics and training. "A good part of what is written is irrelevant to the burning issues of development and good governance, which are central to the welfare of the vast majority of our people," he said. "And, what is worse, some of what is written flies in the face of African decency, respect for authority and the right of maligned people to respond." The UNDP resident representative in Tanzania, John Hendra, said the aim of the initiative was to ensure that all Tanzanians were empowered through information that would enable them to make choices that would enhance their livelihoods, as well as to be able to contribute to policies that mattered to them.