Goodluck receives assurance that Tanzania's presidential elections will be free and fair

FORMER president Dr Goodluck Jonathan has obtained an assurance from Tanzania's President Jakaya Kikwete that the forthcoming general elections in the country will be free and fair and will meet up with global standards.

 

Dr Jonathan has been named as the chairman of the Commonwealth Observer Group that will oversee the pools on Sunday and has been charged with ensuring that they meet up to international standards of acceptance. Tanzania's presidential elections are poised to be close contest as President Kikwete, is ineligible for a third term and the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party has selected works minister John Magufuli as its presidential nominee.

 

Its former favourite Prime Minister Edward Lowassa has subsequently defected to the opposition Chadema Party where he will stand as its presidential candidate. Already the government has warned politicians to refrain from engaging in witchcraft as candidates resort to rituals in what is expected to be a tight race.

 

Yesterday, President Jonathan led a delegation to the presidential villa in Dar es Salam where he thanked President Kikwete for the invitation extended to the Commonwealth. He informed President Kikwete that members of the group comprising 14 eminent persons drawn from across the different regions of the Commonwealth are already being deployed in small teams to various provinces across the country to observe preparations ahead of polling day.

Dr Jonathan said: “On election day, they will observe opening, voting, closing, counting and the results management process. Our team has a mandate to conduct the observation in an impartial, independent and transparent manner.

“We will issue an interim statement on our preliminary findings shortly after the elections, while a final report will later be shared with relevant stakeholders after it had been submitted to the secretary-general. In any election, there are winners and losers and the presidential candidate who loses on Sunday should gracefully concede the election to avert a political crisis.”

He also commended the country for its history of being a stable democracy with no military intervention in governance as had been the experience of many countries. President Kikwete reassured Dr Jonathan that the 2015 elections would be peaceful, free and fair unlike the previous ones that were marred by quarrels and tension.

 

President Kikwete said: “We have made adequate preparations for the elections and you can be rest assured that it will be peaceful, free and fair. You can see that everywhere is calm and visitors hardly notice that we are about having a major election."

 

Over the last week, Tanzanian newspapers have been pouring encomiums on former President Jonathan, describing him as a democrat who has pointed the way forward for the rest of Africa.  Tanzanians are generally happy to see Dr Jonathan lead the Commonwealth election monitoring team because of his exemplary feat of conceding defeat even before the end of the Nigerian electoral process and subsequently handing over power to the opposition party.