TANZANIA BY-ELECTION: AN EASY WIN FOR RULING CCM

UNCLAS DAR ES SALAAM 000074

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

AF/E FOR JLIDDLE, INR/AA FOR FEHRENREICH

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PREL KDEM TZ
SUBJECT: TANZANIA BY-ELECTION: AN EASY WIN FOR RULING CCM

REF: A: Dar es Salaam 31; B: 2008 Dar es Salaam 722


1. (U) Ruling CCM party candidate Rev. Luckson Mwanjale cruised to
victory in the January 25 by-election in Mbeya Rural district (see
ref a). Mwanjale captured 75 percent of the votes, slightly down
from the near 80 percent won by the prior CCM candidate. Very low
voter turnout, 34 percent, may have been partly attributable to the
absence of the CHADEMA candidate, since CHADEMA declined to throw
its support behind the leading opposition candidate, from the Civic
United Front (CUF). As in the Tarime by-election (ref b),
candidates from smaller parties had negligible impact: the Sauti ya
Umma candidate earned fewer than 500 votes out of the 44,000 cast.


2. (SBU) Accredited diplomatic observers to the election, including
from the Embassy's Millennium Challenge Corporation office, met with
election officials, police and party leaders, including the CUF
candidate and CCM political leader (and former Prime Minister) John
Malecela. Before the election, CUF complained of excessive police
presence, bias on the part of the Returning Officer, and CCM use of
government equipment, including vehicles, in the campaign. Malecela
was dismissive of CUF (and seemingly of multipartyism) and implied
that CCM would win on the strength of party loyalty rather than the
character or opinions of its candidate, who was not made available
to observers. The Regional Commissioner, who is responsible for
public security, told of rumors that CUF had brought in youth gangs
for intimidation; however, there were no reports of violence during
the polling.


3. (U) Observers from the diplomatic community saw a significant
need for voter education and better organization on the part of
electoral officials. Many voters, particularly women, required
considerable assistance in the voting process. While some polling
stations were well run, others had a much more chaotic environment,
with deficiencies including failure to ink the fingers of voters who
had cast their ballots and failure to post openly the registration
list. In addition, some polling stations had extra clips for
closing ballot boxes, which could have created the opportunity for
tampering. In several cases, voters' names appeared twice on
registration lists.


4. (U) After the initial ballot counting at each polling station,
the results in favor of CCM were clear. The National Electoral
Commission only released the results two days later, however, in
part because of CUF objections to the process in some polling
stations. Even after the announcement of the results, CUF continued
to complain in the media that the election had not been freely and
fairly conducted, and threatened to take legal action. By the end
of the week, Rev. Mwanjale had been sworn in as Tanzania's newest
MP.


5. (SBU) Comment: Taken together, the Mbeya Rural and Tarime
by-elections may give a good indication of the shape of the 2010
election processes in mainland Tanzania. NEC has the capability to
run an election with minor disruptions, but may not devote as many
resources to contests where the outcome is clear in advance
(especially in CCM's rural strongholds). Where CCM is sure of
victory, the real struggle will be within the party to secure the
nomination. The tendency of losing candidates and parties to reject
results, even where election flaws are minor relative to the margin
of victory, is disturbing, though at least on the mainland any
unrest will be quickly contained. It will be important for the U.S.
to contribute credibly to the election monitoring operation for

2010. End comment.

ANDRE