The Economist: East African Common Market-It really May Happen.

[Kiranga]

http://www.economist.com/world/middleeast-africa/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15179478

East Africa's common market
It really may happen

Dec 30th 2009 | KIGALI
From The Economist print edition
The region’s leaders take another step towards building a common market

FREE-TRADE fingers crossed, some time this summer goods should start being sold without tariffs across borders within the five countries of the East African Community (EAC). The new common market will take in 130m-plus people in Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. The next step is monetary union, with political federation a far remoter prospect. The agreement signed last year at the EAC’s headquarters in the Tanzanian city of Arusha was a first step. Optimists say the EAC should join free-trade blocks in southern and western Africa before 2030.

The EAC is working off a small base. Its combined GDP of $75 billion is a sixth of Belgium’s. But scrapping tariffs should boost regional trade and improve competitiveness. The EAC should be better placed to trade with Congo, Ethiopia and Sudan. And if it can build its own wider manufacturing base, its goods may start to compete with cheap stuff from China.

Kenya, which has the region’s strongest manufacturers, retailers and banks, is sure to gain most. But for the EAC to succeed, others must win too. Rwanda and Burundi should benefit from cheaper and quicker transport of goods to and from the ports of Mombasa and Dar es Salaam. Uganda is well placed to expand its agriculture for export.

Tanzania is less certain to gain. It wants to keep some taxes on goods from Kenya. And it is wary of the free movement of labour, fearing that, in many professions, pushier and better-educated Kenyans will come and snatch plum jobs.

Faustin Mbundu, a Rwandan who chairs the East African Business Council, says the real benefits of the common market will accrue only with more and better roads, railways and power stations. Some say a new capital for the EAC must be built from scratch, perhaps on a shore of Lake Victoria, with a new international airport to match Nairobi’s.

But simpler things will be needed a lot sooner. For instance, border crossings will have to be kept open at night. Mr Mbundu wants to end the scourge of informal police checkpoints. Above all, the governments will have to avoid policy reversals that pander to their own industries, a tendency that has hitherto stood in the way of a proper common market.

 

[Wacha1]

Lakini Tanganyika si ndio tumeungana na Zanzibar lakini hadi kesho hakuna usalama? Kwa maoni yangu Tanzania ndio nchi ambayo ina experience ya kutosha kwenye haya mambo ya kuungana kuliko nchi yoyote ile.

UAPTA mnaikumbuka - iliishia wapi?

East African Passports Ziliishia wapi?

SADCC inakwenda kuishia wapi?

COMESA inakwenda kuishia wapi?

Nani wanaonadi miradi mingi hapa ni wale wale IMF, WB, au mashirika ya nchi za Magharibi. Hivi ni kwa nini mnafikiri hawaachi kutusaidia na kuchukua kwa mkono wa kushoto?

Katika nchi zote hizi Mafisadi ndio wengi wanatafuna pesa za walipa kodi hivi wanatafuta namna ya kujificha.

Hapo juu mwandishi hakuonyesha mahali popote kitu ambacho Tanzania itafaidi. Bali kwa wenzetu watafaidi nini.

Big is not always beautiful.

 

[Kiranga]

Lakini Tanganyika si ndio tumeungana na Zanzibar lakini hadi kesho hakuna usalama? Kwa maoni yangu Tanzania ndio nchi ambayo ina experience ya kutosha kwenye haya mambo ya kuungana kuliko nchi yoyote ile.

UAPTA mnaikumbuka - iliishia wapi?

East African Passports Ziliishia wapi?

SADCC inakwenda kuishia wapi?

COMESA inakwenda kuishia wapi?

Nani wanaonadi miradi mingi hapa ni wale wale IMF, WB, au mashirika ya nchi za Magharibi. Hivi ni kwa nini mnafikiri hawaachi kutusaidia na kuchukua kwa mkono wa kushoto?

Katika nchi zote hizi Mafisadi ndio wengi wanatafuna pesa za walipa kodi hivi wanatafuta namna ya kujificha.

Hapo juu mwandishi hakuonyesha mahali popote kitu ambacho Tanzania itafaidi. Bali kwa wenzetu watafaidi nini.

Big is not always beautiful.

Wenzako wanaongea muungano kutoka perspective ya kiuchumi, sio kisiasa.

Nimeona The Economist inarudia kile kile tunachosema kila siku hapa, kwamba under the prevailing conditions hili swala la EAC litaifaidisha zaidi Kenya na nchi itakayopoteza zaidi ni Tanzania.

 

[tgeofrey]

Ulikuwa imara ulitujenga wanamaombi na wenye remote controll ya umasikini wetu wa kudumu wakauvunja. Vipi kaka /dada mama/baba zangu mliokuwepo huyu mzee njonjo alihusika vipi na kuvunjika kwa eac miaka hiyo mimi nilikuwa nanyonya.

 

[Wacha1]

Wenzako wanaongea muungano kutoka perspective ya kiuchumi, sio kisiasa.

Nimeona The Economist inarudia kile kile tunachosema kila siku hapa, kwamba under the prevailing conditions hili swala la EAC litaifaidisha zaidi Kenya na nchi itakayopoteza zaidi ni Tanzania.

Uchumi sio siasa?

 

[Kiranga]

Uchumi sio siasa?

Uchumi sio siasa,

Ila kuna siuasa ya uchumi na uchumi wa siasa, lakini uchumi si siasa.

Uchumi unajihusisha primarily na allocations za resources.

Siasa sanasana ni kutumia influence ili kuweza kupata na kutumia public policy.

Ndiyo maana mtu anaweza kukuambia kwamba Tanzania as a nation imefanikiwa kisiasa (national unity, less classic society etc) kuliko kiuchumi.

There is a subtle but very noticeable demarcation line. Ndio maana una Political economy kwenye kina Karl Marx/ Friedrich Engels na Das Kapital na Austrian Economics za kina Ludwig von Mises na Hayez.Hiyo ni political Economics, usiichanganye political economics na pure politics.

 

[Wacha1]

Uchumi sio siasa,

Ila kuna siuasa ya uchumi na uchumi wa siasa, lakini uchumi si siasa.

Uchumi unajihusisha primarily na allocations za resources.

Siasa sanasana ni kutumia influence ili kuweza kupata na kutumia public policy.

Ndiyo maana mtu anaweza kukuambia kwamba Tanzania as a nation imefanikiwa kisiasa (national unity, less classic society etc) kuliko kiuchumi.

There is a subtle but very noticeable demarcation line. Ndio maana una Political economy kwenye kina Karl Marx/ Friedrich Engels na Das Kapital na Austrian Economics za kina Ludwig von Mises na Hayez.Hiyo ni political Economics, usiichanganye political economics na pure politics.

Sasa unakula matapishi yako na kujificha kwenye lingo absolutely @bullshit@.

 

[Mister-G]

Ndiyo maana mtu anaweza kukuambia kwamba Tanzania as a nation imefanikiwa kisiasa (national unity, less classic society etc) kuliko kiuchumi

......oh really now, please do tell national unity while there are still grumplings about the union.....less class society please redefine this there are the chosen few who have it all and the many who dont have much at all( rich and poor).

 

[Kiranga]

Sasa unakula matapishi yako na kujificha kwenye lingo absolutely @bullshit@.

Matusi si jadi yangu, kama umeshindwa kujadili hoja kikombe cha mitusi ninakupa.

 

[Kiranga]

......oh really now, please do tell national unity while there are still grumplings about the union.....less class society please redefine this there are the chosen few who have it all and the many who dont have much at all( rich and poor).

Kuna nchi wenyewe hawazitambui kama nchi, Wa Nigeria wakikutana wanaulizana wewe Igbo au Hausa, Fulani au nani?

Sisi ukikutana na mbongo poa tu, napiga kiswahili mnapeta. Hili ndilo naliongelea.

Kamwe mi si mtu wa kutetea status quo lakini ukiona kwako kunaungua kwa mwenzio kunateketea.Tanzania tunaishikia bango kwa sababu tunailinganisha na nchi ziloizoendelea na tuna aspire kwa higher standards, which is a good thing and that is how it should be. Lakini ukitaka kuilinganisha na nchi za dunia ya tatu nyingi kwenye mambo ya kisiasa, kuanzia uhuru wa kujieleza mpaka classes katika society utaona katika kundi la kukosa sisi tunaongoza kwa uafadhali.

Really now, katika watu milioni arobaini wangapi grumplings za union ni top priority yao? Especially ukiwatoa wana CUF wa Zanzibar ambao hata hatujui ajenda zao?

Sikatai classes zinaanza ku emerge now, mimi naongelea classes za miaka mia kadhaa ambazo Nyerere aliziua mara baada ya uhuru, sasa hizi zinazo emerge sasa hivi kwa kutokana na geopolitics zilizo nje ya uwezo wa Tanzania huwezi kuzisema kwamba ni Tanzanian in nature, they are more global in nature going back to Khruschev and Gorbachev, and Perestroika and Glasnost and the fall of the Berlin Wall and Communism.

Lazima tuweke vitu katika perspective tunapoongea.

 

[Mister-G]

Really now, katika watu milioni arobaini wangapi grumplings za union ni top priority yao? Especially ukiwatoa wana CUF wa Zanzibar ambao hata hatujui ajenda zao?

You may be correct in that.... let us enlight all with the true cost of the union to all concerned and have an open referendum which is unbiased without strings attached and see exactly how many individual will come up with this issue as their concern....
at times many an individual may not express their thoughts for fear of touching on issues that are deemed 'taboo' in established quarters......

And as to the emergence of what may appear to be these class divisions now, I am afraid they have been around for quite some time.....the scale of which may only be appearing to some in the current enviroment......