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Political Parties

The creation of a democratic one—party nation under the leadership of Julius Nyerere, a man dedicated to the preservation of political competi tion, resulted in the establishment of a loosely knit internal party organization. All of the national organs of political expression were encouraged to express themselves through the Tanganyika African National Union [TANU] organization to ensure that pol itical competition would take place within the party and its affiliate structures. This was in preference to the establishment of a multi—party system where party struggles were viewed as being more disruptive than beneficial, especially as election time approached.

In outlining various methods for social interaction to take place , President Nyerere designed certain guidelines in what is known as the Arusha Declaration of February 1967. Perhaps the main purpose of the Declaration was to show that all segments of the population were equally important and should progress together rather than one progressing at the expense of another, as under the capitalistic system. The Declaration called for ending most of the material privileges of the established elite. It demanded that the state better serve the interests of the urban workers and rural peasants, repudiated foreign aid as an erosion of sovereignty, and insisted on the construction of a motivating ideology which would unite and lead the people.

The Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) is the most powerful element in the entire society, and it is the party that dictated the wording of the Constitution as well as the content of legislation passed by the assembly. The CCM was created in early 1977 by the merger of the mainland party—Tanganyika African National Union (TANU)--and the Zanzibari party — Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP).

Despite the large number of different ethnic groups which comprise the population, mainland Tanzania is peaceful and stable with few tribal or regional divisions - a legacy of the Nyerere years. Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) remains the overwhelmingly dominant force in mainland politics. The CCM’s ability to control the process of political change through the exercise of a de facto, if no longer de jure, monopoly of political power has produced a degree of stability but also set limits to the extent of systemic change. While reforms have ushered in multi-party democracy; the CCM has continued to hold the presidency and had an overwhelming majority of parliamentary seats (264 of 324 as of 2012).

Political change in Tanzania over the 1990s was characterized by notable political liberalization and the reintroduction of formally democratic institutional structures, but progress in consolidating democratic processes was more limited. Although marking a momentous event in Tanzania’s political development, the transition to a multiparty system in 1992 was accompanied by only limited institutional change and resulted in few meaningful alterations in the operative rules of the political game.

The law requires that persons running for office must represent a registered political party. The law prohibits unregistered parties and independent candidates. There were 18 registered parties in the country.

The registrar of political parties has sole authority to approve registration of any political party and is responsible for enforcing regulations on registered parties. Parties granted provisional registration might hold public meetings and recruit members. To secure full registration and be eligible to field candidates for election, parties must submit lists of at least 200 members in 10 of the country’s 30 regions, including two of the five regions of Zanzibar, within six months.

The law requires political parties to support the union between Tanganyika and Zanzibar; parties based on ethnic, regional, or religious affiliation are prohibited.

During 2013 there were occasional restrictions on the parties’ right to call for demonstrations.

The election law provides a “gratuity” payment of TZS 40 million ($25, 000) to MPs completing a five-year term. Incumbents can use these funds in reelection campaigns. Several NGOs and opposition parties criticized this provision for impeding aspiring parliamentary candidates from opposition parties from mounting an effective challenge.

In January 2010 the Tanzanian government proposed a bill, The Election Expenses Act, 2009, to regulate the funding of political parties. It required that the source of all individual donations to political parties exceeding TZS$500,000 (about US$367) and donations from organizations exceeding TZS$1 million (about US$734) be disclosed to the Registrar of Political Parties with in 30 day of receipt.

The country’s three largest political parties are secular, but include the opposition Civic United Front party, often associated with Zanzibar’s Muslim community, and the opposition Chadema party, often associated with the Christian majority on the mainland. Divisions between the opposition parties have long hampered their effectiveness, but they said they had now embarked on talks to name a single election candidate in 2015.

With regard to relations between the CUF and the government authorities, the CCM-CUF agreement (muafaka in Swahili) reached after the January 2001 disturbances did not yield the hoped-for results despite support from international partners. However, the agreement contributed to greater fairness-with the electoral laws amended, the CUF now represented on the Zanzibar Electoral Commission (ZEC), the acceptance by both sides of a code of conduct and meetings between Karume and Hamad in mid-September 2005. In the parliamentary elections held on 14 December 2005, 19 out of the 232 members directly elected to parliament belonged to the CUF, making it second after the Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), which won 206 seats. In the presidential election, held at the same time as the parliamentary election, Ibrahim Haruna Lipumba took approximately 12 percent of the vote, putting him in second place after Jakaya Kikwete, who was elected president of Tanzania

In the presidential and parliamentary elections held on 30 October 2005 on Zanzibar Island, out of the 50 seats in Zanzibar's parliament, the CUF won 19, finishing second to the CCM, which won 30. Seif Shariff Hamad, the CUF secretary-general won approximately 46 percent of the vote in the presidential race, finishing second behind the CCM's Amani Abeid Karume, who became president of the island with 53 percent of the vote. However, the elections were tainted by fraud and the CUF refused to concede victory to Amani Abeid Karume. Riots broke out when the CCM victory was announced two days after the 30 October 2005 elections and that security forces attempting to suppress the protest killed five opposition members.

The Democratic Party (DP) is the most prominent unregistered party in Tanzania. The government has refused to legalize the DP because it has failed to present the requisite number of party members from Zanzibar as required by law. The DP is led by Christopher Mtikila, a Christian fundamentalist who is the Reverend of the Full Salvation Church. The DP calls for the dissolution of the Union Government of Tanzania and has openly campaigned for the separation of the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba from mainland Tanganyika. The DP supports the expulsion of minorities from the mainland. The DP and its leader, Rev. Mtikila, have promoted hatred towards non-African business persons, particularly those of Arab and Asian descent.

Rev. Mtikila was born in southern Tanzania in 1950. He studied abroad and became active in the human rights organization of the Full Salvation Church known as the Liberty Desk. He is described as a "dangerous opportunist" and a highly polemic individual. Others view him as a champion of ordinary people in a struggle against Gabocholis (a derogatory term used to describe Tanzanians of Asian origin). Toward the end of 1995, a growing sense of Tanganyikan nationalism was taking hold and there was an increase of separatist sentiment on the mainland. DP leader, Rev. Mtikila, one of the most extreme advocates of separatism, launched verbal attacks against Islam, the religion adhered to by the majority of Zanzibaris.