The Guardian 7 April 2017

By Polycarp Machira,Dodoma

PRIME Minister, Kassim Majaliwa yesterday maintained that the country is on the right track, citing gains made in the one year of the fifth government.

Moving the 2018/19 budget estimates for his office, he said some of the achievements include the decision to relocate to Dodoma, adding that over 2000 public servants have since moved to the political city designate.

He said the number include ministers, deputy ministers, permanent secretaries and heads of departments who were scheduled to move during the first phase of the programme.

On the state of the economy he said the country was on the right track as evidenced by the seven per cent in gross domestic product growth in 2016."Our economy is strong and that is why our country was mentioned as one of the few countries that registered steady economic growth in the continent," he said.

Speaking about job creation, the Premier said the government had created 418,501 jobs by March, this year in implementing the 2015 election manifesto, stating that 57 per cent of the jobs were in the private sector.

In the same vein, Majaliwa said the government plans to employ 4,129 mathematics and science subjects teachers in both primary and second ary schools.

According to the PM, the government had improved revenue collections from an average of 850 billion/-to 1.2 trillion/-per month. This is in line with the increased number of tourists from 1,137,182 in 2015 to 1,284,279 in 2016, being an increase of 12 per cent leading to revenue collections of $ 2 billion.

To facilitate focus on industrial economy, he said the government is in talks with six pension funds NSSF, PPF, LAPF,GEPF, PSPF and NHIF which had agreed to revive 27 industries which were not doing well in different areas of the country but did not name them.

"I urge other state-owned corporations to make sure that they focus on the government priorities especially the industrialisation drive being implanted," he noted.

Majaliwa said that initial evaluation showed 55 districts were hit by the drought and encouraged the private sector to regulate the situation by buying food from areas with surplus and sell to the areas which have shortages.

He also said the government had bought and distributed 1,969 tonnes of seeds which could grow in the areas affected by drought. In supporting the agriculture sector, Majaliwa said the government had cancelled some nuisance charges in the sector especially on cotton, tea and cashew nuts.