Tanzania President Samia Suluhu is taking a drastically different path from the one charted by her predecessor John Magufuli, rolling back some of his controversial decisions such as on Covid-19 and curtailing media freedom.
Yesterday President Suluhu announced plans to form an advisory committee to devise a new Covid-19 response framework for cooperation with the international community on how to fight the pandemic.
She also unbanned media that had been shut down due to controversial laws. Her decision on Covid-19 was a dramatic about-turn on Dr Magufuli’s rigid stance, who stubbornly refused to acknowledge the disease.
“We cannot continue to bury our heads in the sand. I shall form a committee of experts to look at it professionally and then advise the government. It should not be silenced or rejected or accepted without professional research,” President Suluhu told an audience of new senior government officials— including ministers who had taken an oath of office in Dar es Salaam.
Aware that the event was being televised across the region, she acknowledged that the country’s policy had isolated it from the rest of the world.
“We cannot isolate ourselves as if we are an island. That is not to say we can accept everything brought to us, (but) we cannot continue reading about Covid-19 globally, yet (our) policy remains incomprehensible.”
Tanzania’s stance on Covid-19 had baffled the world. While many countries insisted on wearing masks in public spaces, washing hands and keeping distance, Tanzania did not make it compulsory, and sometimes those wearing masks were chided.