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On 3^rd  May, 2013, Minister of State (Policy, Coordination and Parliamentary Affairs), Mr. William Lukuvi announced to the National Assembly the government’s decision to nullify the 2012 form four examination results and its directive to the National Examination Council of Tanzania (NECTA) to re-standardize the results. According to the announcement, the decision was reached by Cabinet following revelations by the preliminary report of the National Commission of Inquiry into the 2012 Results of the Form Four National Examination that 2012 examination candidates had been graded using a new and previously untested grading system which neither they nor their teachers knew anything about. The unfairness of this action was described as the basis for Government’s decision.

After careful consideration of Government’s statement on the issue, civil society in Tanzania takes the following position;-

1.      Although we have not seen the full report, the position of civil society is that the Government should not merely have nullified the 2012 form four national examination results. We request the report containing the findings and recommendations of the National Commission of Inquiry into the 2012 Results of the Form Four National Examination be made publically available. This is so that education stakeholders have the opportunity to examine what it has to say about what caused mass failures in the 2012 examinations.  By simply nullifying last year’s results, without allowing for public discussion of the report and its findings, Government seems to be suggesting that if there are any other factors behind the 2012 examinations results, then they are not as significant as the issue of the grading system used.

However, civil society and the public at large understand that over the past couple of years, the form four national examination results have been steadily deteriorating; in 2009 for example 27.5 per cent of the candidates scored division zero, while in 2010 the number increased to 49.6 per cent though it was slightly better at 46.4 per cent in 2011 before increasing to 60.5 per cent in 2012. Between 2009 and 2011, 86.9 of all the candidates who sat for the exam scored between division four and division zero. In the light of this trend, we believe that the grading system used is not the main reason behind the mass failure seen in 2012. It is for this reason that we request the Commission’s official report to be made public so that the other factors (which we believe have been featured in the report) will help direct what measures and steps we should take as a country to rescue the education sector.

For several years now, civil society, educationists, activists and other stakeholders have repeatedly pointed out weaknesses in the education sector and public education system. They have variously pointed out that there are not enough qualified teachers (especially for science subjects) in school and that even those that are in school are often not motivated to teach due to tough living and working conditions, including the matter of huge sums in unpaid dues. In-service training has not been adequately provided so that there is also a lot of confusion and limited understanding of the requirements of the 2005 competence-based curriculum and syllabi currently in use. In addition to that, schools are operating without enough teaching and learning materials such as books and science laboratory equipment. There has been much discussion and evidence presented concerning the challenges associated with the use of English as the language of instruction at secondary school level, without adequate mastery by both teachers and students. The budget set aside for education development is inadequate and schools can hardly meet running costs due to insufficient and often late receipt of the capitation grant. Finally the lack of participation and interest in education by parents and the general public is distressing; add to that a weak inspectorate department and you get schools that are operating in relative isolation, with limited accountability and support to address the challenges they are facing.

2.      Leave alone the issue of grading, these are formidable challenges contributing to mass failure and they need to be addressed. But if government is to proceed in its proposed action, it should clearly explain the merits and weaknesses of the grading system used and which is now being overturned. It should also clearly identify and hold accountable whoever was responsible for allowing its use in the 2012 examinations. This clarification is more important than merely moving to nullify the examinations results as it will provide the public with a clearer understanding of what happened. Since the government has issued a directive to standardize the examination results according to the 2011 rating system, civil society urges that this process should be transparent and should involve other education stakeholders in order to promote the legitimacy of the subsequent results. The involvement of other education stakeholders will validate the exercise much more than if it was to be carried out by NECTA and other government agencies alone.

3.      While Government is ostensibly right in taking action, it should bear in mind that if indeed one of the main reasons behind last year’s dismal performance was essentially the irresponsibility of those mandated to mark and grade the form four national examinations, then they need to be held accountable. It must be remembered that a number of young people committed suicide upon receiving their grades, numerous others experienced various levels of psychological trauma and parents and families used considerable resources to address this. What will happen to those families that have for instance paid for their sons and daughters to re-sit the exam? How will all of these variously affected people be compensated? Government needs to be much more careful about how it handles the education of its citizens as the precedent set by this year’s examination grading fiasco will likely continue to haunt us at the national and international level for years to come.

4.      In March this year, soon after the 2012 form four national examinations results were announced and soon after revealing the existence of a new grading system, NECTA responded to public concerns over mass failures by denying that it had already used the proposed grading system.  In addition to that, following the announcement of the 2012 results, Dr. Shukuru Kawambwa, Minister for Education and Vocational Training, provided an elaborate explanation behind last year’s massive failure that said nothing about the use of a different grading system. According to the Government’s statement, however, we are expected to believe that this was in fact the case. Who should we trust? NECTA and the Minister or Cabinet and the Commission? It goes without saying that the handling of this issue has been particularly poor and it raises fundamental questions about the competencies of the authorities mandated to manage the provision of education in Tanzania. Based on this, civil society would like to reiterate how important it is that Government holds responsible the minister and all other high-level officials in the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training.

5.      HakiElimu’s 2012 research report, School children and national examinations: who fails who? explored the factors behind poor form four national examination results in 2011. In the report, HakiElimu pointed out clearly that the examination marking process as managed by NECTA involved a high level of secrecy, especially concerning the use of continuous assessment scores, which limited the ability of other education stakeholders to monitor, question and hold the examination council to account. Examinations do not reflect the reality of teaching and learning in schools due to the numerous challenges therein. While we recognize the sensitivity of the examination setting and marking process, we believe that it is quite possible that NECTA’s limited accountability to education stakeholders got us here. Things need to change and teachers, who are heavily involved in implementing the curriculum need to be more effectively involved in setting it so that they understand what is required of them. For instance, many still do not understand what the 2005 move from a content based to a competence based curriculum requires of them and they continue to teach in the same old ways. This episode shows the extent to which NECTA operates in isolation and the potential dangers of this. It is important for various education stakeholders to be involved in and informed about everything that the examinations council decides and they need to be consulted and given enough time to understand it before a new grading system is put to use.

6.      Once again, civil society would like to urge government to put in place evidence based strategies to improve learning in schools and to work on the challenges affecting it. Poor examination results are an indication that there is serious problem in the learning process. It is impossible to deal with the kind of challenges that currently haunt the examination sector by standardizing examination results alone and this move has numerous dire consequences. For instance, last year’s poor performance in the standard seven national examinations caused the government to lower the cut off mark for entry to secondary school to 70 out of 250. The government’s decision resulted in secondary schools accepting students who did not meet the required standards; some of them could not even read and write. Literacy, which is one of the basic indicators of learning, is on the decrease while the public education system is expanding. This shows that there is formidable problem in our public education system and that this problem is not just limited to the assessment process. Government has clearly compromised on the capacity of students by lowering standards at standard seven and by removing filters such as the form two qualifying national examination and this is affecting learning outcomes as a whole. Students who sat for the form four examinations last year and as far back as 2009 did not sit for a qualifying exam in form two. What then makes the Government anticipate better examination results than the ones we see? The Government now needs to put in place a more effective learning assessment system that meets national and international standards. It needs to make a serious commitment to invest in education and avoid wasting our children’s time by putting them in schools without ensuring that they are learning.

This statement has been made by; Hakielimu,Policy Forum, Sikika,TenMet and TGNP

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Policy Forum was invited to attend the 2013 the IMF and World Bank Spring Meetings in Washington DC that brought together thousands of government officials, journalists, civil society organizations, academics and private sector representatives. The meetings are held annually to discuss progress on the work of the World Bank and the IMF and include a series of seminars, regional briefings, press conferences, and many other events focused on the global economy, international development, and the world’s financial markets.

For CSOs attending, there were pre-Civil Society Forum events including orientation sessions on the IMF, aimed at introducing IMF policies and programmes, and the World Bank, which focused on the three major agencies of the World Bank Group – IBRD, IFC and MIGA – and its four independent compliance mechanisms. CSO representatives in attendance also met Washington-based NGO speakers and other CSOs who shared lessons on engaging the WB and IMF around development policies including key issues such as climate change, safeguards and open development.

The meetings also offered CSOs attending an opportunity to meet with the Executive Directors of the World Bank Group to exchange views on policy issues such as poverty eradication, governance and climate change.

The IMF was keen to demonstrate tools to support its policy advice to low-income countries so they held a session on this and gave some country examples of their application and how they help strengthen financial sector surveillance, manage natural resource revenues and assess the linkages between scaling up of public investments, growth and debt sustainability.

With world growth currently below pre-recession levels, it was timely that the IMF and Oxfam International co-sponsored a discussion on IMF job and growth to focus on over 200 million people out of work and the subdued global output, as well as discuss what governments can do to support inclusive growth.

For more details, visit:

http://go.worldbank.org/IIF7M9XOM0

Introduction: Last week, the Controller and Auditor General (CAG) tabled in the Parliament the annual general report of the CAG on the financial statements of the central government for the year which ended June 30, 2012 in compliance with Article 143 of the Constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania and Section 34 of the Public Audit Act No. 11 of 2008. The report highlights some of the issues that impede the efficiency of Central government, Local government, Public Authorities and other bodies in realizing their objectives. The main purpose is to draw the attention of the Executive, Legislature, Judiciary, Development Partners and the general public about the state of public finances as well as give recommendations on how to address any shortcomings.

For years now, the parliament has developed an impeccable precedent on how MPs debate and respond to the CAG’s report upon being submitted to house pursuant to section 34(2), 35(2), 37(3) and section 38(1) & (2) of the Public Audit Act No. 11 of 2008. One among the remarkable precedent that will be left as a legacy to generation is that of April 2012 where MPs across party lines said enough and demanded the resignation of at least eight ministers over CAG’s revelation of corruption and embezzlement of public funds. This made history on our efforts to claim accountability and brought trust and respect to the house from the eyes of the public.

Unfortunately, while the public is awarding credit and trust to their representative, the Parliament does not seem to appreciate all this and takes for granted the trust to handle business on our behalf, and the house is at move to waive the tax payers’role on deciding affairs of their country. The recent attempt to amend the Public Audit Act (House Hansards of 8thof February 2013), and abolition of the Parastatal Organizations Accounts Committee (POAC) are among the parliament’s action that should warn us the house serves not to our interests but rather to self-interest..Policy Forum’s BWG would wish to alert the public that according to the amendment (as passed on 8thof February 2013) of section 38 (3) of the Public Audit Act requires the report of the Controller and Auditor-General to be laid before the National Assembly concurrently with a consolidated response and action plan that is to be prepared by the Paymaster General. This, in turn, prevents the National Assembly from discussing the CAG report until the Paymaster General received and consolidate the response and action plans of all audited institutions. We are now observing that the Parliament discusses the budget estimates without taking the Auditor-General’s report and the Paymaster General’s response and remedial action plans into account. But it is critical that the Parliament considers those response and action plans beforeit approves the budget of ministries to ensure the custody and safety of public money

Surprisingly, and as if the attempt of February 2013 was not enough, soon after the CAG has complied to the statutes by presenting his 2011/2012 audit report, the parliament during a media briefing on Monday, 4thof April 2013, through the National Assembly's Assistant Director of Information, Mr Deogratius Egidio explained to the journalists that due to limited time and the change of timetable, the CAG reports was not going to be discussed during the ongoing budget meeting.”(Source: Alvar Mkakyusa. “Tanzania: Bunge Session Kicks Off on Tuesday in Dodoma”9thApril 2013. Internet; www.AllAfrica.com

We, the Members of the Budget Working Group (BWG) from among CSOs, regret to inform the public that, we have done our homework from among the trusted sources and the Monday 4th press briefing was a serious matter , this year’s CAG Report which, although was submitted before Parliament,   will not  be discussed in the House.  Although the requisite to a discussion is not explicitly stated, BWG takes this as a serious violation of the developed precedent which has for years interpreted the provisions of the Public Finance Act, Public Audit Act and the Constitution to the effect that THE PARLIAMENT then upon receiving the CAG report is supposed to discuss the reports and enquire explanation and recommend actions to be taken. The parliament should understand that this interpretation and precedent has been adopted by the public and they are kin waiting to hear from them over the CAG’s findings.

If the Parliament insist not discussing the report for whatever good reasons they might have, BWG takes that as betrayal to their own people and action could actually mean eroding the value and importance of having CAG conducting public audit because the law does not give him mandate to sanction nor order actions to be taken to the faulted, the parliament has that power and it is obliged to account to the public on the action taken. 

Decision to abolish POAC & attempt to amend the Act No 11, 2008

The Public Accounting Act, section 38(1) directs the Public Accounts Committee, Local Authorities Accounts Committee (LAAC) and Parastatal Organizations Accounts Committee (POAC) that they “must”(Shall) discuss the reports of the Controller and Auditor-General after they have been tabled in the National Assembly. Section 38(2) states “upon completion of hearings, the Parliamentary Oversight Committees shall prepare and submit to the National Assembly reports which may include comments and recommendations. Reading between the lines and relating to what the parliament has done this year, obvious section 38 of Act No 11, 2008 has been clearly violated. Now according to the changes neither the oversight committee nor the parliament will discuss the report.

However the recent decision of the Speaker of the National Assembly, Hon. Anne Makinda announcing to abolish the Public Organizations Accounts Committee (POAC) and merging its duties with those of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), is clearly going against section 38 of principal Audit Act which recognizes and vests mandate to the POAC. This will also lead to miscarriage of justice and BWG supplements CAG’s concerns that PAC will not manage to perform even half of its duties by these changes. According to the CAG,Mr. Ludovic Uttouh, merging the functions of the parliamentary POAC to PAC implies that PAC will not be able to handle its oversight functions effectively because it will be overwhelmed with work. He noted that merging of PAC and POAC was not a sound decision because even before the merger, PAC was already overwhelmed. “The trend shows that PAC hardly fulfilled its obligations each year now that we have added public organisations to it, I think it needs miracles to work effectively,”is reported to have observed.

BWG recommends that POAC be restored and the Parliament should find some time to discuss the CAG report. We are aware that the CAG‘s authority is confined to giving opinions and recommendations. Parliament is the only independent body that has powers not only to discuss, analyze but also order and take action against the Government. It should not run, from its responsibilities.

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For more information, please contact:

Rocio Moreno – Global BTAP Coordinator – rocio@globalbtap.org or mobile: +52 1 55 54024133

www.makebudgetspublic.org

Tunis, March 25, 2013 – Today the Global Movement for Budget Transparency, Accountability and Participation (BTAP) launched the Make Budgets Public Now! Campaign at the World Social Forum. The Campaign seeks to increase budget transparency, accountability and participation in countries that currently have the least transparent budget processes, which dramatically reduces citizens’ ability to engage in decision-making processes that have a direct impact on their lives.

For this reason, the campaign will focus on ensuring that at a minimum all governments:

1. Publish the budget proposal that is discussed and enacted by the legislature, which allows citizens to know how their government plans to spend the public’s money.

2. Publish an independent audit report, a document that evaluates a government’s performance.

3. Conduct public hearings during the budget debate in the legislature where citizens can provide input on their needs and preferences on how to spend their resources.

4. Publish a citizens budget, a document which provides key budget information in easily understandable language and accessible formats so that every citizen can understand the government’s plans for spending public money.

These key documents and opportunities to participate are essential for citizens and civil society seeking to understand and engage in the national budget process, as the information provided in these reports strengthens oversight mechanisms. Therefore, they offer the opportunity to influence budget allocations before these are actually approved and the information needed to monitor actual spending for public services on the ground.

Despite substantial improvements in budget openness during the last decade, progress has been unequal among countries. According to the International Budget Partnership’s Open Budget Index 2012, an independent and comparative measure of budget transparency in 100 countries, 77 countries — home to half the world’s population — fail to meet basic standards of budget transparency. Transparent and inclusive budgets are essential tools for combating corruption, reducing inefficiencies in public spending and improving aid allocation.

BTAP is convinced that participation in the decisions related to public budgets is a fundamental right and responsibility of all citizens. In addition, citizen participation is useful to improve the decision-making process and management of public assets.

The campaign will be conducted at three levels (national, regional and international) and will demand that governments respect citizens’ right to information and participation in budget process. National campaigns will be launched in Vietnam, Kyrgyz Republic, Fiji Islands, El Salvador and Tunisia, as they are among the countries scoring lowest on the 2012 Open Budget Index. As an example, with a score of 6 out of 100, Fiji got a lower score than China’s 11, and came in well below the score of his New Zealand neighbor’s 93.

Through the implementation of a multi-layered set of activities and advocacy demands concerning the publication of budget key documents and the opportunity of citizens to express their interests and views through public hearings, the campaign seeks to make sure that these countries meet the most basic standards for open budgeting and citizen participation is allowed.

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