AfricaPress-Tanzania: THE National Assembly yesterday approved a 199.75bn/- budget for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and East African Corporation in which 10 per cent will be extended to expand and advance its foreign relations policy.
Tabling the budget estimates, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and East Africa Cooperation, Prof Palamagamba Kabudi said the government had registered a series of achievements during the past five years including launching eight diplomatic missions and three consulates in Qatar, Turkey, Republic of Korea, Sudan, Cuba, Israel, Algeria, Namibia and Mombasa, Dubai and Jeddah respectively.
“This means we now have 43 diplomatic offices and three consulates. During the same period, Ethiopia and Poland opened their diplomatic mission in Tanzania, making 62 foreign missions in the country and 30 international corporations,” the minister told the parliament.
The minister said the embassies have thus helped improve the number of tourists’ arrivals between 2015 and 2018 to over 5.234 million who toured various attractions. The tourists are from Africa, Europe, North America, Asia, Middle East, Australia and the Caribbean.
Prof Kabudi said the ministry had to play an important role in coordinating the arrivals of specialist doctors from the United Arabs Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Israel, Italy, China, India, Pakistan, America, German and Cuba.
He earlier urged the Parliament to endorse the ministry’s 20bn/- budget for development projects. The new application is almost 20 per cent increase to the 4bn/- budget which was released for the same purpose in the ending fiscal year.
The ministry 2020/21 budget plan also includes developing a database for the diaspora that will help coordinate how the group could contribute towards improving the country’s social and economic development.
According to the minister, the fund will help implement the ministry’s fifteen-year, 2018-2031, strategic plan of building, buying and rehabilitating diplomatic offices and residencies abroad.
The minister detailed that part of the money, 1.8bn/-, will be channeled to build diplomatic office and residence in Moroni—Comoro, 3.69bn/- will be used for the same in Muscat—Oman and 1.5bn/- is meant for the construction of fencing for Tanzania owned lands in Kigali, Maputo, Bujumbura, Riyadh and Lilongwe.
“We’re also building a commercial complex in Nairobi in addition to a diplomatic office at the cost of 3.9bn/-. An additional 2.28bn/- will be used to elect a commercial complex and office building in Kinshasa—Congo,” he noted.
The embassy of Tanzania in Washington D.C will receive 3.86bn/- for rehabilitating its structures, while the mission in Harare—Zimbabwe and Kigali—Rwanda will receive 275m/- and 260m/- respectively for rehabilitating structures. Apparently he said the Dar es Salaam—based diplomatic college will receive 2.37bn/- to build more classrooms.
Salumu Mwinyi Rehani, presenting the opinion of the parliamentary committee on foreign affairs, defence and security urged that the government must intensify public awareness campaigns to help the general public understand and take part in international opportunities.
The committee believed there has been a slow involvement of the private sector in exploiting potentials that come with the country being part of the East Africa Community and the SADC.
