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body which requires foreign investment inasmuch as it also seeks to expand its global investments into mineral value addition and beneficiation.
The approach taken by Botswana of citizen economic empowerment has the same thrust as the indigenisation ethic in other SADC countries. The policy seeks to protect and provide a framework for the promotion of greater participation of the Batswana in their mainstream economic activities. By offering protection and preference to citizen business the citizen empowerment ethic tends to be inward-looking and not supportive of regional transnational investment which the regional integration of SADC has set out to promote. Similar challenges have been observed elsewhere in the SADC in the implementation of such an ethic. One major challenge has been the failure of the policy to eradicate poverty. With the majority of the people in Botswana and indeed the SADC being poor, there is need to rethink the African economic ethic of indigenisation, or citizen economic empowerment as it may be known in Botswana, to bring benefits and relief to the majority poor citizens.
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people of Tanzania to participate more in the economic activities and manage a large segment of their economy, leading to improved living standards (Kamba, 2009). The economic empowerment drive is expected to contribute to poverty eradication and to bring about sustainable economic development in Tanzania. To achieve this, the National Economic Empowerment Act is put into operation by the National Economic Empowerment Policy of 2004.
7.5.1 Early Economic Empowerment Efforts
In Tanzania there seems to have been slow progress in the development of a fully-fledged economic empowerment framework. The reason could be that the first president of Tanzania, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, was not supportive of economic empowerment since he equated it to reverse apartheid (Nyerere,1968). Instead Nyerere opted for the Ujamaa Villages which were to be the centres of human development and self-reliance following a collective socialist development model. His socialist model failed to effectively reduce poverty (Kamuzora, 2002).
Those who were charged with executing economic empowerment understood it as a transformative initiative which is not easy to define but can be seen in the changes in the economic and social lives of the people. Kwayu (2006) sees empowerment as an initiative to give people control of their own lives, politically, socially and economically. Empowerment is usually aimed at marginalised groups and intended to distribute power and wealth. Kwayu (2006) noted that for Tanzania, economic empowerment was for the majority of Tanzanians who were denied the opportunities historically to participate fully in the economic activities of their country. There was a need to have Tanzanians owning and running their economy. Economic empowerment in Tanzania was also because there was observation of very limited participation in economic activities by local Tanzanians for many years.
Before the independence of Tanzania in 1964, People in the then Tanganyika were systematically denied the opportunities to take part fully in main stream economic activities.
Most people in the then Tanganyika were compelled to participate in the informal sector of the economy while the formal sector and larger part of the economy was under the control of the whites. Land was confiscated and redistributed to the whites. In 1961 when Tanzania got its
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independence it only attained political power and not economic power. Economic power remained with the whites and a few privileged citizens. For this reason, there was the Arusha Declaration which argued that the state should ensure that the majority of Tanzanians should take command of the economy. This saw state enterprises being established and supported by the state to produce goods and provide services. Capital and operating costs were met by the state and support kept coming even when the enterprise experienced losses (Mwaiselage, 1999;
Kwayu, 2006:6).
From about 1972 to 1982 there were efforts to get the majority of Tanzanians to participate in mainstream economic activities through cooperatives. The control and support of cooperatives was initially more in the hands of the local authorities and the people themselves. This was to change at some point with central government becoming more pronounced. This did not produce the desired results of empowerment and the government had to revert to enabling greater control of the cooperatives to the local authority and the people. On the operations of state-owned enterprises, in 1992 Tanzania came up with a privatisation policy. This was after the realisation that state enterprises were not performing well and had become a burden to the state.
Unfortunately, indigenous Tanzanians could not take over the state enterprises because they lacked the requisite skills and capital. This limited the participation of indigenous Tanzanians in the privatisation process despite the establishment of the privatisation trust fund to support the citizens (Kwayu, 2006).
7.5.2 The National Economic Empowerment Policy
The earlier attempt to empower Tanzanians through cooperatives and state-owned enterprises had failed to produce the desired results (Hamisi, 2011). Tanzanians were yet to participate fully in their economy and remained deeply impoverished and illiterate. In view of this situation the government of Tanzania established the National Economic Empowerment Policy. The policy was to provide guidance on how the majority Tanzanians were to participate in all sectors of the economy (Mwaiselage, 1999; Kwayu, 2009). The National Economic Empowerment Policy pointed out among many the following challenges which were identified as constraints limiting the participation of Tanzanians in economic activities:
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• Lack of capital or access to capital;
• Lack of knowledge and experience;
• Inhibiting customs and traditions, no capitalist culture;
• Wrong mind-set towards development;
• Problems related to procedures and implementation of the privatisation policy; and
• Lack of reliable markets (Hamisi, 2011).
The primary objective of the Economic Empowerment Policy was to provide guidelines of how the majority of the citizens of Tanzania would access opportunities to participate in a more meaningful way in economic activities in all sectors of the economy. Policies in each sector of the economy were to give preferential treatment to Tanzanian nationals.
7.5.3 Challenges of Economic Empowerment in Tanzania
Tanzania’s vision 2025 and the National Economic Empowerment Policy emphasise the need for national cohesion which they believe will be achieved when citizens are well empowered and have been availed with equal opportunities for economic emancipation and development.
Kashuliza (2013:4) observed that there were still gaps in the access to resources by Tanzanians.
Also noted were the high levels of poverty which could end up affecting the drive to achieve national cohesion negatively. After the liberalisation efforts of the mid 1980s the drive towards privatisation of state-enterprises was welcome as they had been a burden to the tax payers.
However, there were perceptions that foreigners and a few rich nationals, especially of Asian descent, were benefitting more from the privatisation measures. The majority of the people were poor and could not raise the required capital. For Tanzania there has been a new drive to bring foreign investment, hence, the new wave or new form of economic nationalism. In this effort foreign investment has been welcome. This has also come with a new thrust, to empower Tanzanians without any racial divisions (Mwapachu, 2013).
The continued participation by the rich and foreigners appears to leave out the majority poor who have no financial capacity to compete for private investments in national natural resources (Mwapachu, 2013). There is a need for robust empowerment initiatives to secure the interests of the majority poor Tanzanians. Some win-win mechanisms need to be identified. This approach to
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empowerment seems to acknowledge the hegemony of neo-liberal capitalism and in some way, it can be a means of bringing in private sector participation in empowerment. This could be another way to rethink the African economic ethic of indigenisation while acknowledging the role of a market driven economy in economic development.