Women get top posts in new cabinet.

One of the most striking aspects of the new Tanzania cabinet named by president Jakaya Kikwete is the number and position of women who have been appointed.

Six women were given cabinet portfolios and about half of the 31 assistant ministers are women. Kikwete also broke with the general African tradition of appointing women largely into innocuous portfolios dealing with gender issues, youth or community development. Important as these portfolios may be, they are not given the seriousness they deserve. In this cabinet, the two key ministries of finance and foreign affairs go to women underlining the real change in the status of women in the country.

However, the size of the new cabinet has received mixed reactions. Many have criticised it for being bloated--it is 60-strong--and a strain on a poor country. The expenditure for running such an enlarged edifice will shoot up considerably. Three new ministries have been created although others have been merged.

Kikwete was praised for dropping 14 of the 26 ministers who served under former President Benjamin Mkapa. Almost all the political dinosaurs of the ruling Chama cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party--some of whom had served as ministers for four decades--have been elbowed out.

Kikwete's first appointment was not unexpected. Edward Lowassa, the new prime minister, is his friend and political ally. Sources close to the inner circle say that in July last year, the two had agreed that Kikwete would run for the presidency on the ruling party's ticket and that Lowassa would be appointed prime minister. Both are regarded as no-nonsense individuals who are expected to adopt an uncompromising approach on issues of governance. Tanzania will witness for the first time the sacking of non-performing ministers and those involved in corruption will be taken to court.

New look to cabinet

The Finance Ministry is now under Zakia Hamdan Meghji, the first woman in East Africa to hold such a portfolio. Born in Zanzibar, Meghji is a highly motivated individual. At school in Zanzibar she was decidedly Leftist, confounding her peers by talking about socialism and Marxism. It could hardly have been otherwise as her elder brother was the secretary-general of the short-lived Zanzibar Communist Party.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

But it was at the University of Dar es Salaam where she did her undergraduate studies that Meghji cut her political teeth. She is identified more with mainstream Tanzanian politics and has earned herself a reputation as an 'Iron Lady', in her previous stint as Tourism and Natural Resources Minister under Mkapa.

She is credited with having revived the ailing tourism sector to make it a key foreign exchange earner for the country. Equally, important was her boldness in confronting powerful individuals linked to some political heavyweights in the country by banning the export of logs and cancelling the export licences of several firms.

Kikwete expects her to bring the same dedication to her new ministry where her former ideological bent should serve her well in balancing the dictates of market economics with the welfare of the downtrodden in Tanzania.

The former finance minister, Basil Mramba, has been given the new--but key--portfolio of infrastructure, works and communications development.

Another first in Tanzania, is the appointment of another female minister to a heavyweight post. As with Meghji, Dr Asha-Rose Mtengeti Migiro, the new foreign minister, is distinguished by her eloquence, dedication to work and impeccable record in public service. She is cerebral and many say that she could easily became the first female president in East Africa.

The former deputy minister for energy and minerals, Dr Ibrahim Msabaha, has been promoted to full minister in the same ministry. The previous holder of the post, Dr Abdalla Kigoda, a close associate of Mkapa, has been dropped from the cabinet. Kigoda was responsible for some of the controversial contracts signed with foreign firms in the mining sector. His sacking and the removal of Mramba from the finance portfolio are seen as an indictment of Mkapa's management of the economy that many believe has benefited foreign investors at the expense of Tanzanians.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Kikwete has also moved Profesor Phimemon Sarungi from the Defence Ministry. Last year, Sarungi was involved in a controversial arms procurement deal that threatened to strain relations between Tanzania and Belgium. The deal was eventually scuppered. Sarungi's replacement, however, is puzzling.

The new defence minister, Professor Juma Kapuya, has low ratings in his performance as the former minister for sport and youth. Speculation is that he did not feel challenged enough in such a lightweight ministry.

Another puzzling appointment is of the political lightweight, Dr Hussein Mwinyi, a Turkish-trained medical doctor and a former deputy health minister, who also happens to be the son of former President Ali Hassan Mwinyi. He has been put in charge of Union affairs. Many regard the portfolio as being too complex for him and it could turn out to be a poisoned chalice. Perhaps it is significant that Kikwete has placed him the office of vice-president Dr Ali Mohamed Shein.

But, according to the rumour mills in Tanzania, the young Mwinyi is being groomed to succeed Zanzibar's President Amani Karume as the isles' president. Karume too is a son of a former Zanzibari president.

Not in the cabinet, but perhaps the most powerful person after Kikwete is the president's long-term political associate Rostam Aziz, the Oxford-educated economics graduate, business tycoon and parliamentarian.

Aziz is a Tanzanian of Iranian extraction with family links in Iran and business links in the other Gulf countries. He has been described as the 'king maker', having played a pivotal role--over a 10-year period--in getting Kikwete nominated by the CCM as its presidential candidate. Content to play the role of the 'power-behind-the-throne', Aziz has not been keen to be in the cabinet as that would have prevented him from concentrating on his vast business interests.