The new government of President John Magufuli in Tanzania has earned praise on issues ranging from corruption to stopping ivory trafficking. And he has helped change the tone of Tanzanian politics, encouraging politicians to be less self-serving.
But the world headlines about Tanzania recently have not reflected that positive change. The most prominent headline this week is The Telegraph declaring: “’Disaster’ for safaris in Tanzania as government unleashes tourism tax.” This came about after the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism failed to give adequate notice of a change in taxation of tourism. While the tax may or may not be appropriate, the Ministry provided no notice, throwing the entire important economic sector into a “complete and unmitigated disaster.” The market for wildlife tourism in Africa is competitive if this action by the Ministry scares operators and tourists, they can easily chose to go to Kenya or South Africa.
The problem with this tax announcement from the wildlife perspective is that tourism income is the main vehicle to finance conservation in the country. When the elephant population is already in steep decline because of poaching, a reduction in anti-poaching funding could speed up the possible extinction of elephants from Tanzania.
Last week, the headline was the Washington Post: “Tanzania gives hunting permit to a firm despite video of animal abuse.” This came about after you guessed it the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism allowed a United Arab Emirates company with a known criminal history to begin operating again in the country after what most news reports have said we’re bribes paid to Ministry officials. The company was previously kicked out of the country for “appalling” violations of Tanzania’s laws.
The common theme in all these bad headlines for Tanzania is the new Minister of Natural Resources, Jumanne Maghembe. In the case of the Telegraph report, Maghembe is guilty of simple incompetence for not planning ahead for the impact of tax changes on the tourism industry. In the case of the Washington Post report, Maghembe is allegedly guilty of much worse, including accepting bribes from a United Arab Emirates’ businessman in exchange for giving conservation land and hunting permits to rich poachers, according to experts cited in the story. The exact nature of any bribes has not yet been made public but in the age of the Panama Papers and transparency organisations, it is perhaps only a matter of time.
Tanzania has significant promise but someone one single Minister is limiting that progress. If Tanzania is to move forward economically, its time for Maghembe to step down.
The risk for Tanzania of course is that this is just the tip of the iceberg. If these two crises were created by the Minister in one month, what is next?
But the world headlines about Tanzania recently have not reflected that positive change. The most prominent headline this week is The Telegraph declaring: “’Disaster’ for safaris in Tanzania as government unleashes tourism tax.” This came about after the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism failed to give adequate notice of a change in taxation of tourism. While the tax may or may not be appropriate, the Ministry provided no notice, throwing the entire important economic sector into a “complete and unmitigated disaster.” The market for wildlife tourism in Africa is competitive if this action by the Ministry scares operators and tourists, they can easily chose to go to Kenya or South Africa.
The problem with this tax announcement from the wildlife perspective is that tourism income is the main vehicle to finance conservation in the country. When the elephant population is already in steep decline because of poaching, a reduction in anti-poaching funding could speed up the possible extinction of elephants from Tanzania.
Last week, the headline was the Washington Post: “Tanzania gives hunting permit to a firm despite video of animal abuse.” This came about after you guessed it the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism allowed a United Arab Emirates company with a known criminal history to begin operating again in the country after what most news reports have said we’re bribes paid to Ministry officials. The company was previously kicked out of the country for “appalling” violations of Tanzania’s laws.
The common theme in all these bad headlines for Tanzania is the new Minister of Natural Resources, Jumanne Maghembe. In the case of the Telegraph report, Maghembe is guilty of simple incompetence for not planning ahead for the impact of tax changes on the tourism industry. In the case of the Washington Post report, Maghembe is allegedly guilty of much worse, including accepting bribes from a United Arab Emirates’ businessman in exchange for giving conservation land and hunting permits to rich poachers, according to experts cited in the story. The exact nature of any bribes has not yet been made public but in the age of the Panama Papers and transparency organisations, it is perhaps only a matter of time.
Tanzania has significant promise but someone one single Minister is limiting that progress. If Tanzania is to move forward economically, its time for Maghembe to step down.
The risk for Tanzania of course is that this is just the tip of the iceberg. If these two crises were created by the Minister in one month, what is next?
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