Political Institutions under Liberalisation

The continued political dominance of the pre-reform ruling party over the period of liberalisation and high levels of political stability distinguished Tanzania and Vietnam from many other developing countries. During the same period, the political system in both countries was also characterised by very high levels of corruption and pervasive

patron-client relations that operated within the ruling party. In both countries, economic liberalisation was accompanied by certain forms of political reform. Differences emerged between the two countries as Tanzania moved away from the one-party system and instead became a dominant party system¹. Yet despite this important difference, there were many similarities between the ways that the parties continued to be organised in both countries under liberalisation.

Formal changes to the relationship between CCM and the state were introduced in Tanzania from 1992 and multiparty elections started in 1995. The factors that led to Tanzania’s adoption of multiparty elections included changes in the international context due to the ending of the Cold War, the move to democratic governance in other ex-socialist states and increasing donor conditionality linked to democratisation. Factors internal to the Party were also critical in this decision. The Nyalali Commission was set up by the President in 1991 to assess public support for the one-party system. While it found little public demand for a move away from the one party system there was a vocal minority who wanted the change. Some of the top leadership within the CCM, most notably Nyerere, also supported a process of democratisation (Vener 1996).

The early move to multiparty politics allowed the CCM to introduce a new constitution that was favourable to its own position of strength. For example, the new rules on public financing for political parties meant that a party was entitled to a government subsidy proportional to the number of seats it had in Parliament. This gave the CCM a huge financial advantage over its rivals (Mmuya 1998). Over the period of liberalisation, five main opposition parties were established: the Civic United Front (CUF), National Convention for Constitutional Reform (NCCR-Mageuzi), Chama Cha Demokrasia na Maendeleo (CHADEMA) and the United Democratic Party (UDP). These parties were predominantly organised by individuals who had previously held senior positions within the CCM. None of the parties had a distinct ideology although some of the parties were built on regional support bases.

In the first three rounds of national multiparty elections, these opposition parties failed to make a significant impact on the political dominance of CCM. They suffered from

lack of funding and internal divisions significantly reduced their effectiveness (Mmuya 1998). The CCM increased its total support from 59% of all votes in 1995, to 65% of votes in 2000, to 70% of votes in 2005 (Skinlo 2007). Further, the advent of multiparty elections actually led to decreased competition in around 13% of seats as under the one-party system the CCM fielded multiple candidates while under the new political system, the weak opposition parties could not afford to stand candidates in all seats (Kelsall 2003)². Most district and village authorities also remained under the control of the CCM (Pallotti 2008). Thus, electorally, the CCM remained in a dominant political position throughout the period of economic liberalisation.

Structure of the Party

The centralised structure of the party institutions that was established under the formative socialist political settlement changed very little under liberalisation. The Party Congress, the National Executive Committee and the Central Committee of the National Executive Committee made up the top level of the party at the national level. In theory, the Party Congress was the apex institution within the Party. In reality, decisions were highly centralised and determined by the Central Committee of the National Executive Committee (Kelsall et al. 2005). Methods of central control within the Party remained strong. The NEC and the Central Committee took on the role of controlling the elite within the Party. The Central Committee controlled party patronage by monitoring the activities of members and recommending appointments and removals of party officers or even expulsion of members (Skinlo 2007). The President, who was also Party Chairman, exerted power over the party through selection and appointments to positions throughout the state (Kelsall et al. 2005). Tight elite control even at the very top was evident from the fact that there were fairly regular reshuffles within the top party structure (Wang 2005). This reduced the ability of any senior politician to build up stable factional support within the party.

2 Where multiparty politics has been most contentious has been on Zanzibar where CUF has a strong presence. Zanzibar has a population that is lower than many of Tanzania’s regions but it has been a political flash point during the period of liberalisation. The main political contention is between CCM and CUF and national elections have been accompanied by violence and accusations of election rigging. The political conflicts on Zanzibar are rooted in its specific colonial history and struggle against the Arab dominated Government that succeeded the British in 1961 (Maliyamkono and Kanyongolo 2003).

The removal of the one-party clause in the constitution also brought about the formal delinking of the CCM Party and the State (Wang 2005). Overall, however, the CCM has kept a significant degree of control over the other institutions of the state. Certain public service positions remained restricted to members of CCM and public servants prepared performance results against the objectives of the CCM manifesto, even at the local level (Kelsall et al. 2005). Permanent Secretaries and their deputies were Presidential appointees. Newly appointed civil servants were required to undergo training at the Kivukoni Political Education College. Formal links between the Party and the military were severed but informal links and movement from senior levels of the military into CCM positions remained common (Ramadhani 2001). The Party establishment therefore maintained influence over massive financial, managerial and organisational resources under the state agencies (Mmuya 1998).

While local level state institutions were created that were supposed to be separate from the party, in reality, there was little distinction between local level party structures and state institutions. Local levels of the state consist of regional government institutions in Tanzania’s 26 regions. These were divided into 97 district councils and 25 urban councils. Underneath this were 10,075 registered villages. The Ministry for Regional Administration and Local Government was responsible for local government but in reality the President retained the power to select key state officials. Regional Commissioners, Regional Administrative Secretaries and District Commissioners were all Presidential appointments. Village Councils were elected by the Village Assembly which comprises all adults in the Village. The Party structures at the regional level consisted of the Regional Conference, the Regional Executive Committee, and the Political Committee of the Regional Executive Committee. The power of these regional party institutions was quite limited compared to the central party institutions (Kelsall et al.

2005). At the lowest level of the state and the party, the ten cell party institutions and the state institutions of the urban ward and vitongoji in the Village overlapped in terms of members and activities (Kelsall et al. 2005).

In Vietnam there were changes in the formal relationship between the VCP and the state during the period of economic liberalisation. The Constitution was re-written and amended a number of times to reflect an increased distinction between executive and

powers of the National Assembly and recognised the independent rule of law, but continued to affirm the role of the VCP as the sole force leading the state and society.

Internally, the VCP continued to be organised along democratic centralist lines and power within the Party appeared to be concentrated with its most senior officials. Overall within the Party, the positions with the most formal power were held by the Party Secretary, the President and the Prime Minister (Van-Arkadie and Mallon 2003).

Formally, the National Assembly appointed the President who was officially the Head of State. The President had the power to appoint the Prime Minister and other high level officials. The Prime Minister headed the cabinet that consisted of the heads of 26 Ministries and Commissions. In practice, the Politburo of the Party remained a much more powerful institution than the Cabinet (World Bank 2009).

Throughout the period of liberalisation, the overall leadership of the Party was provided by the Politburo under the General Secretary of the Party. The Politburo was formally elected by the Central Committee, and the Central Committee was elected by the National Party Congress, which met every five years. The Central Committee of the Party had around 173 members and the Politburo had around 14 members (Abuza 2001).

In the early years of reform, the Politburo consisted of people who had played a prominent role during the war. This changed from the early 1990s, however, as the Party Chairs of the high growth cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh were promoted into the Politburo (Gainsborough 2003). The Vietnamese People’s Army remained an important political institution and held around 10% as block seats on the Central Committee (Abuza 2001).

Loyalty to the Party of members of the National Assembly was assessed by the Vietnamese Fatherland Front (VFF) prior to selection (Tonnesson 2000) although officially members were no longer required to be Party members. The umbrella organisation VFF encompassed 25 ‘mass movement’ groups linked to the Party and was defined in the constitution as representing the ‘political base of people’s power’ (World Bank 2009). Membership of the VCP itself was low, at around 3% of the total population (Abuza 2001).

As in Tanzania, government and VCP institutions remained closely linked at lower levels of the state. Under the Central Government level there were 58 provinces and five

municipalities. These five municipalities, Ha Noi, Hai Phong, Da Nang, Ho Chi Minh City and Can Tho had the same political status in party and state structures as the provinces. The provinces were divided into districts, provincial cities and towns which were subdivided into towns or communes. The municipalities were divided into rural districts and urban districts, which were subdivided into wards. The ward was the lowest level of officially recognized state structure, although some villages retained separate party structures and some had appointed village leaders at this level within the ward (Kerkvliet and Marr 2004).

Party institutions existed at each level of the state with a People’s council, People’s committee and branches of the VCP and mass organizations of the VFF. The Provincial Party Committee and the Party Secretary were the most important local level institutions of the Party (World Bank 2009). The People’s Committee acted as the executive agency of the People’s Council at each level. Provincial Party Secretaries were officially selected by the Provincial People’s Council but the Prime Minister had the right to approve or dismiss them. The Provincial Party Committee was responsible for deciding on provincial development strategies and could influence the selection of personnel within the state at lower levels and within State Owned Enterprises. The key officials at the local level of the Party consisted of a group of around twelve people. These were the local party secretary; the chair and vice chair of the People’s Committee; the members of the committee in charge of finance and other significant resources; the head of the local security police; the chairs of the local branches of the significant institutions attached to the VCP such as the VFF, the Women’s Association, Veteran’s Association, Peasant’s Association, and the Secretary of the Youth League branch of the VCP (Kerkvliet and Marr 2004).

Institutions of the central state such as Central Ministries were also replicated at lower levels so each Ministry had Departments that operated at the provincial level. Central Government ministries formally administered their local equivalent agencies by giving instructions through circulars or directives to the local People’s Committee to pass implementing laws that would then formalise the application of the central ministry’s ruling at the local level (Fforde and Pty 2003). In effect, different ministries operated different levels of control in the provinces. For example, the Central Ministry of Planning

Planning and Investment (DPI) produced detailed provincial investment plans and were in charge of business registration and managing the bulk of foreign investment. The main state institutions were replicated at the district level, including departments of ministries while at the ward level the basic state structure included People’s Council, the People’s Committee and the ward branch of the VCP, but at this level there were no judicial institutions. On the ground, there was considerable variation in the relations between these different institutions of the state both horizontally and vertically. In some cases the departments of line ministries provided technical assistance to People’s Committees and influenced local decision-making, while in others they had little interaction (Malesky 2003).

Table 1.10 Comparison of the Institutions of the Party under Liberalisation

Tanzania Vietnam

Political System Multiparty system but CCM

remained the dominant party. One Party State Relationship

District Mayors, Councils and

While the continued dominance of the pre-reform political party appeared to provide a degree of political cohesion and stability that was missing in many other developing countries, both countries were characterised as having very high levels of corruption within the state over the period of liberalisation. In 2005, Tanzania was ranked as 96^th and Vietnam as 144^th out of 159 countries in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index, where countries are ranked in terms of the perceptions of corruption across a range of criteria from least corrupt (1) to most corrupt (159).Studies undertaken by the Governments in Tanzania and Vietnam identified extensive bureaucratic, political and grand corruption as well as theft by state officials and other variants of abuse of office by state officials for financial gain (United Republic of Tanzania 1996), (Committee for Internal Affairs of the Communist Party of Vietnam 2005). High levels of corruption across the period of liberalisation were also a cause of concern for donors and loan conditionality became linked to improvements in governance across a range of state activities. In both countries, corruption appeared to be taking place within the party system based on extensive patron-client relations. The extent and pattern of clientelism was opaque in both countries as it occurred behind the closed doors of the Party institutions. However, over the course of liberalisation an increasing number of cases of

These governance features of a relatively centralised Party with extensive corruption contained within its structures provides an important basis for comparison of economic transition in the two countries.