Africa-Press – Tanzania. TANZANIA has recorded remarkable strides in creating strong public service system, since independence and that has greatly contributed to the development of the national welfare, it was disclosed.
According to the government, as the country celebrates 60th anniversary of independence, the number of public servants has increased from 17,565 in 1961 to 528,290 by last month, and in particular the use of ICT has enhanced efficiency and improve service delivery.
Minister of State in the President’s Office, Public Service Management and Good Governance, Mohamed Mchengerwa told journalists on Tuesday that of the public servants currently in service, 13.8 per cent are health workers and 53.3 per cent are teachers.
Minister Mchengerwa said that as the country attained independence in 1961 it lacked local public servants to take up the posts left behind by the colonialists, because they lacked knowledge and skills.
Currently, as the country marks 60th independence anniversary it has 5,179 doctors in comparison to 12 during independence and 270,424 teachers in Primary and Secondary Schools as well as Teachers ‘ colleges unlike 36 on 9th December in 1961.
Elaborating, the minister commended all the public servants regardless of their cadres in all places of work, saying their hard work, discipline and commitment have made the country make great progress to date.
He further said that by independence, the shortage of staff with required qualifications was a setback to the national development, citing a case study of the engineering section that had only two qualified personnel in comparison to today, where they are 2,462.
The list also included two state attorneys by independence and currently 1,284 with more than 6,000 serving in the private sector.
Equally, the minister commended the Founder of the Nation, the late Julius Nyerere for his devotion, commitment, philosophy and patriotism, which played a great role in building the nation.
He added, “I call upon appointed leaders to emulate Mwalimu Nyerere and other leaders by abiding by code of conducts they left behind.
“Every elected or appointed leaders must be innovative in his/her respective area of jurisdiction, must work hard and his/her expenditures should reflect incomes as stated in Mwalimu Nyerere Scheme of Work of 1976.”
He further said in 1960, the government managed to come up with a locally designed Human Capital Management Information Systems (HCMIS) in Payroll and all human resources matters in the public Service, which before was hiring external designers.
The HCMIS has been a blessing on determining and issuing employment permits for new vacancies and replacements for all public entities.
This has also created a room to scrutinize and oversee preparation and implementation of employment rationalization and personnel emoluments’ budget for effective Human Capital Management and as well control and ensure integrity in payroll management.
Technological advancement are among the achievements in 60 years since independence, seeing the E-Government Agency coming up with systems, which link the government and connectivity and making it easier to manage information and data.
The country also celebrates promoting and monitoring public leaders’ ethical conduct and standards to enhance national development.
Meanwhile, the government has paid a total of 138bn/- in arrears to civil servants since President Samia Suluhu Hassan took the oath of office on March 19, this year.
Minister Mchengerwa, said: “We are still analysing information on over 23,000 civil personnel and the government previously set aside a budget for it after the exercise so that everyone gets his/her right payments.”
Mr Mchengerwa stated that there have been complaints for a long time about civil servants not being paid some of their dues, adding that the government has tried to reduce employees’ arrears at every phase.
According to him, they were about 96,000 employees who needed to be promoted on a single budget, but President Samia raised the figure to 180,000 with further instruction that, whoever would be promoted would be paid a new salary as soon as possible.
“I have instructed personnel in my ministry to compile a database on promotions, compensation claims, and different arrears to protect equity and fairness for public servants,” she said.
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