Is EAC a charity organization?

By Nyasigo Kornel

Free movement of labour has been a confusing concept to most East Africans. A good number of them have taken the term to mean ’go-and-get’ without following the formal procedure!

This is not the first time since the term ’free’ has confused the entire generation. It started with the independence era when people thought that freedom meant things without restrictions.

Charles Taylor did not make a mistake on his book titled A Celebration of Freedom. It relates the former misconception of this generation when most people thought that the freedom given by Whites could bring about accountability without labouring.

How much free movement of labour is free across the region will depend on the qualifications of primary conditions of immigration and labour permission granted to an individual person. Labour, by all means, is a commodity. But the reality is that the movement of labour force is not free. There are regulations to adhere to before what is called free-labour can be free.

Globalization, by any means, is being infringed upon by a host of manmade barriers. Tanzania’s refusal to renew a Kenyan executive’s work permit without explanation has generated fears that the newly rejuvenated East African Community is likely to be experiencing tension.

The refusal to renew the work permit of David Waweru, the General Manager of Mwananchi Communications limited, a subsidiary of Kenya-based Nation Media group, has led the business community in Tanzania to protest that the economic gains realized after the formation of the East African Community’s customs union in January could be reversed.

Analysts fear that economic tension between Kenya and Tanzania could, as happened in 1977 when another version of the community crumbled, water down the efforts gained in making the region a formidable trade bloc with considerable bargaining power in the increasingly competitive global market.

When BBC interviewed Kenya Minister of Labour, John Koech, recently he said that the majority of the rural citizens in the region did not know a thing about (free movement) the process making it difficult to participate in the process meaningfully.

Now it seems contrary that most scholars (who are urban dwellers) are not aware of issues related to East Africa Community with its sister vocabulary of ’free labour movement, or free movement’). East Africa Community will face a lot of challenges because the discussed agenda are made secret between the so-called committee.

The people are not involved, and it is therefore an institution constituted by the people at the top. This will eventually become the idea of three presidents lacking roots in the spirit of the majority in the region. While Kenyans think that Tanzania fear Kenya’s economic strength in the region, the truth is that most Tanzanians do not accommodate the Federation in spirit.

To many people it is just a political mask and to some it means so much to business tycoons who can understand and get direct benefit through calibrated endless discussion at Arusha. The problem with African leaders is that they never allow a national discussion to its own root.

Instead, they do the discussions for the people, we thank them for their hard working, but the risk of such an attitude is decline of the well-established doctrine soon as the establisher die. Tanzania Trade and Industry Minister, Juma Ngasongwa and his Kenya counterpart Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi have for some time locked horns over issues of customs tariffs.

In a recent Arusha conference, Dr. Kituyi complains about the way Tanzania was treating Kenyan businesses and goods.’ The country has caused unnecessary delays to Kenyan goods at the Namanga border, and the recent unjustified sackings of Kenyan chief executives from various organisations go against the spirit of EAC,’ said Dr Kituyi in a statement.

Kenya, however, was accused of multiple charges at Mombasa port, which increased the cost of doing business for Tanzanian and Ugandan business people. The two countries agreed to intervene in the matter.

Meanwhile, the lamentation peaks in the community, Tanzania has also denied claims by Kenya that it did not recognize the quality marks from bureau of standards of the other countries. It was agreed that EAC members should communicate with border stations to accept the three countries’ quality marks.

We clearly need a coherent and ethical policy framework, which deals with immigration and its labour market impacts. As a good practice, policy making should be evidence based. We need to know, for example, whether the wages and conditions advertised when employers are seeking permits, are actually valid.

We need to know whether the influx of people from Kenya and Uganda is greater or less than expected when we make decision to open our Labour Market. We cannot begin to get a grip on this situation unless we provide the means to do so.

That is why having a properly resourced labour inspectorate operating within a legal environment that allows member states to do their jobs in either country is so essential. Such a legal environment does not yet exist in East Africa Community.

It is not good to have high influx of unskilled labour migrants from other country who occupy the space unnecessarily that will not apply as the term ’free movement of labour’. Tanzania is curious about that, and it is because of saving the ’national interest’. Not every labour migrant across the region to Tanzania can be accommodated.

For example, experience has shown that most Kenyans who are employed in Tanzania are in essential casual labour in hotels and tourism sector as tour guards where English language is what becomes essential with little computer skills. This is contrary to what Kenyans have been saying that they are feared in labour competition in the region.

It is wrong and over exaggerated belief. However free the labour market may be, the migrants must not pretend to know more than Tanzanians, especially when you are permitted to work on the land and then you start exercising petty politics, making abusive comments or uttering remarks that do not sit well with culture of Tanzanians, oh !? the political guys will expel you immediately.

That is what David Waweru experienced. If he were to be back in Tanzania, he would no doubt admit that Tanzanians are keen observers of what their visitors do or say. They do not entertain the hakuna matata slogan in the name of East Africa Community.