PF-related

This brief summaries of the findings from an international Open Budget Index (OBI) survey that measured the level of budget transparency in Tanzania in 2008. These findings are important because they provide an indicator of how much information citizens have access to the budget process in Tanzania. They further enable us to assess how we are performing globally.

Over the past years, the government of Tanzania has focused itself on raising revenue from a limited number of sources. Taxation on drinks, fuel, cigarettes & tobacco products, Value Added Tax and Pay as You Earn (PAYE) have been the major focus of taxes. The current general consensus amongst the citizens is that these sectors are already overtaxed and government cannot impose any further taxes in these areas without aggravating the already rising costs of living and sinking the population further into poverty.

The Constituency Development Fund (‘CDF’) is an additional means of financing (sourced from domestic revenue) for community-driven development that is managed at the constituency level by Members of Parliament (‘MPs’). As such it supplements, or operates parallel to existing funding mechanisms for local
government. In East Africa, the CDF has been available in Kenya and Uganda since 2003 and 2005, respectively and in August 2008, President Kikwete fully endorsed the introduction of CDF to Tanzania in his address to Parliament.