The madness of frenzied poll campaigns is upon us yet again

By JENERALI ULIMWENGU

The five-year hiatus between two general elections is ending, and the relative mental serenity we seemed to be enjoying is fast closing shop as we slide into that habitual madness that afflicts us every time we enter into the electoral season.

I am not tiring of writing about this madness, not because I think anyone is listening, but rather because I do not want my grandchildren’s grandchildren to think I was around and said nothing. I do not know the state in which they will find this country, but I suspect it will not be too good. I want them to know that some people went on record to call out those who will have caused it.

The season has started with the usual lopsided optics, with ruling party chiefs at all levels campaigning openly while the restrictions placed on opposition parties by President John Magufuli seem to be holding in all but very few places and instances. Of course, ruling party chiefs including Magufuli and a host of other officials at national, provincial and district levels, and at all levels have not shied away from making utterances in support of the party of government.

That has however not dampened the enthusiasm of those who have declared their intention to vie for this or that office at all the levels. Except for the ruling party, where any overt intention to challenge Magufuli as the party’s presidential candidate is ferociously discouraged, presidential candidates have been numerous, with the principal opposition, Chadema, recording at least nine aspirants, with the chairman, Freeman Mbowe and the vice-chairman Tundu Lissu in contention.

Lissu is the same MP who was shot 16 times in a residential area in broad daylight three years ago, and since then has lived abroad receiving medical attention. He now says he is sufficiently recovered and has announced his arrival for July 28 to seek his party’s nomination to challenge Magufuli in October.

It is a no-brainer to ask oneself questions about the security of someone who so spectacularly cheated death who is now walking straight into the madness of frenzied election campaigns, but Lissu says he is not intimidated. I asked him whether this was not a death-wish, and he replied that whereas he knew there were real security issues, he was not willing to live forever in exile while he felt the country is in need of serious leadership.

Lissu reiterated his criticism of Magufuli on the democracy and governance deficit and the relative isolation he had caused Tanzania to endure vis a vis its neighbours and the intellectual community at large. The outspoken lawyer has spent a lot of his time since recovery doing an international campaign against Magufuli, which could not have gone well with Magufuli’s people, and it is not far-fetched to think that many people will be worried about his well-being upon return.

Meanwhile, former minister Bernard Membe was recently kicked out of the ruling party for expressing his desire to challenge Magufuli for the CCM candidacy at the presidential polls. Membe has responded by joining the novel, but fast-growing ACT-Wazalendo, led by economist-activist parliamentarian Zitto Kabwe, and which has recently added in its ranks Zanzibari opposition linchpin Seif Shariff Hamad as Zanzibar’s presidential candidate. All this has the potential to toss the whole electoral equation in the air, as alliances and allegiances become fluid and the political terrain becomes more slippery.

Before joining ACT-Wazalendo, Seif grappled for power with his former chairman, Prof Ibrahim Lipumba, who seemed to have the support of government officials, and when he was chucked out of the party of which he was once prime mover, he joined Zitto’s tiny outfit, thus giving Zitto political gravitas few could have imagined a semester ago.

From a politician whose sole strength used to be his power of number-crunching analysis rather that a populous constituency, now, Zitto, perhaps unrecognisably, has collected in his stable Seif, the venerated Pemba patriarch and a real potent political dynamo in the Isles, as well as Membe, the man who has become Magufuli’s nemesis recently.

Having these two political constellations will certainly divide the opposition’s votes and give CCM and Magufuli breathing space. But the real significance of these formations will come clearer in 2025, when Magufuli concludes his second and last term, and has to retire. Our local Young Turks will then have a field day.