-Said despite being the area legislator, even he knew nothing about it.
THISDAY REPORTER
Dar es Salaam.
A LEGISLATOR from the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) itself officially questioned the controversial Buzwagi gold mine contract signed by energy and minerals minister Nazir Karamagi, long before opposition lawmaker Zitto Kabwe also raised the matter in parliament and ended up being virtually crucified, it has now been confirmed.
According to the National Assembly’s official hansard record, way back on June 26 this year, Kahama MP James Lembeli bombarded Prime Minister Edward Lowassa with the same type of serious questions regarding why the contract was signed ’in secret’ by Karamagi - with parliament apparently kept in the dark about the whole issue.
Debating the 2007/08 budget estimates of the Prime Minister’s Office, the CCM legislator declared in parliament his dismay at reports that the government had entered into the mining contract with Barrick Gold for the Buzwagi area, with residents of surrounding villages including himself as their MP being told nothing by the authorities.
This was a good six weeks-plus before Kabwe, the Kigoma North MP representing the opposition CHADEMA party, raised his own private motion on the issue at which point it was turned into an unwholesome, political partisanship affair culminating in the bizarre suspension of Kabwe from all parliamentary activity for the rest of the year.
Speaking in parliament back in June, Lembeli openly expressed his own suspicions about the circumstances behind the Buzwagi mining deal, which was eventually signed in London despite all the negotiations reportedly taking place in Tanzania.
Said the ruling party legislator: ’’Recently, I have heard reports on the radio suggesting that a new gold mine known as Buzwagi is to start being built about five kilometres outside Kahama Township. I see this as a serious problem, because I strongly believed that this contract would be different from previous ones.’’
’’But now it seems that everything has been done so secretly that even the Member of Parliament, as the representative of the people in the area, was kept in the dark.’’
Elaborating further on the topic, Lembeli said residents of the villages surrounding the area earmarked under the contract deal - including Mwendakulima, Mweme and Chapulwa ’’have been complaining almost everyday about compensation, and no one can give them a straight answer about what the government says and exactly how much they will be paid.’’
According to the Kahama MP, at one point the area’s district commissioner had to call in riot police to stop enraged villagers from physically attacking officials of the Barrick Gold company.
When Kabwe tabled his private member’s option on the controversial Buzwagi contract in parliament last week, he ignited an extraordinarily fierce debate that appeared to split the House right down the middle in the political divide.
Vehemently calling for the formation of an official parliamentary probe committee to investigate minister Karamagi’s actions in relation to the contract and the process leading to its signing, the CHADEMA legislator cited several possible irregularities in the deal. These included suggestions that the contract was signed in a London hotel instead of at the Tanzanian High Commission offices in the British capital, which was perhaps a better and more official setting for such transactions.
The unfolding debate saw the majority CCM camp of lawmakers in the House strongly and collectively tow the party line in defence of Karamagi, while opposition MPs as a minority bloc were all in favour of the proposed probe.
And as the debate became more and more heated, one CCM legislator - Mudhihir Mudhihir (Mchinga) - tabled his own counter motion asking parliament to suspend Kabwe from parliament until early 2008, allegedly for committing perjury in saying Karamagi had misled the House over the Buzwagi contract issue.
With the consent of presiding House speaker Samuel Sitta, the counter motion was approved through an on-the-spot vote in which the CCM lawmakers vastly outnumbered their opposition counterparts.
It has now emerged that despite the eventual partisan debate on the Karamagi saga, it was actually one of the ruling party’s own MPs who first raised alarm bells on alleged irregularities in the Buzwagi mining contract deal.
President Jakaya Kikwete was scheduled to visit the controversial Buzwagi gold mine as part of his ongoing tour of Shinyanga Region. At the same time, a local newspaper yesterday quoted a State House spokeswoman as saying that Karamagi, as minister for energy and minerals, had full authority to sign such mining contracts without informing the president. .
No comments:
Post a Comment