{UAH} Tanzania would rather be in Southern Africa, it seems

Tanzania would rather be in Southern Africa, it seems

Updated Sunday, September 1st 2013 at 19:42 GMT +3

By PETER WANYONYI

As if expelling Banyarwanda was not enough, Tanzania has been in focus the last few months for some decidedly anti-integrationist statements and actions.

When Dar is not slapping arbitrary charges on otherEast African Community citizens for daring to step onto its territory, it is behaving like a jealous regional sibling bent on making life as difficult as possible for everyone else.

When the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport caught fire recently, all regional airports chipped in to help with passenger traffic except, officials claim, forTanzania's airports, which were immediately closed to Kenyan traffic.

When Kenya had a big food shortage two years ago,Tanzania immediately banned maize sales to Kenya, citing its own food insecurity. A week later, Dar sold the maize to Uganda. And last year, Kenya expressed interest in buying any excess natural gas fromTanzania's vast Songo Songo fields.

Dalliance

The Tanzanian response was curt: The gas is for domestic consumption only and is not for sale. This sounded like a good domestic policy until Tanzaniawent ahead and sold the gas to the Chinese.

The pattern that emerges is one of Tanzania walling itself away from the rest of the region, perhaps informed by its dalliance with the Southern African Development Community, a South-Africa-run group that rivals the East African Community, for Dar's attentions.

Amusingly, Tanzania, like Kenya and the rest of the EAC, is desperately poor. In fact, slightly worse. One would have imagined that opening up its borders to investment and skills from across the region, like  Kagame's Rwanda has done, would be a no-brainer.

But when Kenyan tour agents began selling Mt Kilimanjaro trips to Europeans, who first sunbathe in Kenya before going to Tanzania, Tanzanians asked Kenyan tour agents to stop using photos of "its" Mt Kilimanjaro on their brochures!

___________________________________

Gwokto La'Kitgum

"Even a small dog can piss on a tall Building", Jim Hightower

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