Category: The Citizen

Unguja. The husband of President Samia Suluhu Hassan, Mr Hafidh Ameir Hassan has been buried in Kizimkazi, South Unguja Region, leaving behind two widows, four children and 15 grandchildren.

The funeral prayer held on Monday, September 7, 2026, was led by Zanzibar Grand Mufti Sheikh Saleh Omar Kaabi.

Government, religious and political leaders attended the funeral, led by Vice President Deogratius Ndejembi, Zanzibar President Dr Hussein Ali Mwinyi and Prime Minister Mwigulu Nchemba.

Who was Hafidh Ameir?

Reading the deceased’s biography, Deputy Director of State House Communications, Mr Shabaan Kisu, said the deceased was born on January 1, 1946, in Kisakasaka village, West B District, Urban West Region, Unguja.

He said the deceased began his education at Kombeni Shakani School in West B District, completing primary education in 1960 before proceeding to secondary education at Tumekuja Secondary School in Mkunazini, where he graduated in 1965.

‘Throughout his life, the deceased continued to take advantage of various educational and training opportunities to advance his professional knowledge, particularly in teaching and agriculture,’ he said.

According to Mr Kisu, in 1970 Hafidh joined the Zanzibar Teachers’ College and graduated in 1973.

He was subsequently employed as a teacher and taught at various schools in Tanzania.

He said in 1980 Hafidh was selected to study agriculture at Uyole Agricultural College in Mbeya, enabling him to expand his knowledge and skills in agriculture, which became an important part of his professional life.

In 1982, he was employed as an agriculture instructor at Fidel Castro School in Pemba.

In 1986, he secured an opportunity to further his studies in agriculture in Sri Lanka, where he pursued a diploma and graduated in 1988, specialising in coconut farming.

After returning to Zanzibar in 1988 following his studies in Sri Lanka, the deceased continued working at the Ministry of Agriculture.

Mr Kisu said that, determined to further his academic qualifications, the deceased pursued a master’s degree in agricultural machinery engineering in Britain in 1990.

After completing his studies in Britain, he returned to Zanzibar and continued working at the Ministry of Agriculture until his retirement in 2005.

After retirement, the deceased continued teaching at Kizimbani Agricultural College in Unguja.

Before his death on September 7, 2026, he had been suffering from heart disease and had received treatment at various hospitals.

Others who attended the funeral included Zanzibar Second Vice President Hemed Suleiman Abdullah, retired fourth-phase President Jakaya Kikwete, former Zanzibar President Amani Abeid Karume, former Zanzibar President, Dr Ali Mohammed Shein, and former First Vice President of Zanzibar Othman Masoud Othman.

Others were CCM Mainland Vice Chairman Stephen Wasira, CCM Zanzibar Deputy Secretary General Abdi Mahmoud Abdi, as well as ministers and deputy ministers from the Union Government and Zanzibar Revolutionary Government.

London. Africa’s private credit market is set for further expansion as companies and infrastructure projects seek alternatives to constrained bank lending, credit ?ratings firm Moody’s said in a report on Tuesday.

The continent’s credit industry remains small but has grown rapidly in recent years, with assets under management rising to $5.6 billion at the end of 2025 from $1.8 billion in ?2020, according to the report.

Moody’s said demand would continue to ?be supported by the region’s persistent financing gap, underdeveloped capital ?markets and limits on banks’ ability and willingness to provide long-term financing, ?particularly for infrastructure projects, medium-sized companies and small businesses.

The report added that ?even after the rapid growth in recent years, Africa accounts for just 0.3% of the global private credit market, which is estimated to be worth at least $1.8 ?trillion.

The ratings agency said development finance institutions would remain a key source ?of funding for the sector in Africa and could help mobilise international capital through credit-enhanced ?and blended-finance structures.

Such arrangements could support highly rated senior loan tranches and broaden the appeal of African private credit to institutional investors including pension funds and insurers.

At the same time, private credit is unlikely to become ?a major competitor ?to African banks, ?as funds often lend through banks or co-finance transactions, particularly in infrastructure, where financing needs remain substantial.

Moody’s said ?achieving significant scale would require the industry to demonstrate ?consistent ?returns that compete with opportunities elsewhere, particularly given investor concerns about frontier-market risk and the mixed historical performance of Africa-focused private investment funds.

The report also ?highlighted ?that stock market capitalisation across the continent ?stood at around 33% of GDP in 2024, well below the respective emerging market and global ?averages of 61% and 113%.

Dar es Salaam. Exim Bank Tanzania has marked its 29th anniversary by taking its celebrations into communities through clean-up campaigns and donations of cleaning equipment across the country.

The bank, which was established in 1997, is marking the anniversary with activities being conducted in selected markets, hospitals and schools within its branch network.

In Dar es Salaam, the celebrations included the donation of cleaning equipment to Kinondoni Municipal Council and a clean-up exercise at Kawe Beach involving bank employees, stakeholders and community members.

Exim Bank Head of Marketing and Communications Stanley Kafu said the anniversary was an opportunity to recognise customers, employees, partners and communities that had contributed to the bank’s growth.

‘Our 29-year journey has been built together with our customers, employees, partners and the communities we serve,” he said.

“Every customer who has trusted us, every business we have supported and every partnership we have built has contributed to the institution Exim Bank is today,’ he added.

Mr Kafu said the decision to focus this year’s celebrations on community activities reflected the bank’s commitment to supporting communities beyond financial services.

‘Environmental cleanliness is a shared responsibility, and through these activities and the donation of cleaning equipment, we are contributing in a practical way while encouraging more people to take ownership of the spaces we all share,’ he said.

Speaking on behalf of Kawe residents, Ward Councillor Benard Fabian Malima commended the bank for selecting the area for its anniversary activities.

‘Kawe Beach is a space that many people in this community use daily, and keeping it clean is something that benefits all of us,’ he said.

Mr Malima said the cleaning equipment donated to the municipal council would support ongoing efforts to maintain a clean environment, calling on other institutions to follow suit.

Since its establishment, Exim Bank has expanded from serving a relatively small customer base to having more than 30 branches in Tanzania and operations in Comoros, Djibouti, Uganda and Ethiopia.

The bank says it was the first Tanzanian bank to open branches outside the country and currently serves more than 170,000 customers.

Beyond banking, the lender has also invested in community programmes through its Exim Cares platform, focusing on health, education, youth development, women’s empowerment and environmental conservation.

Its initiatives include blood donation campaigns, support for Young Scientists Tanzania, the Women Empowerment Programme and environmental conservation activities.

Through the women’s programme, the bank aims to reach more than 600,000 women by 2028.

As it approaches its 30th anniversary, Exim Bank said it would continue focusing on innovation, customer experience, business support and community development.

Dar es Salaam. More than 100,000 smallholder, medium and large-scale farmers are expected to gain access to agricultural drone technology for crop spraying and monitoring under a new partnership between Mati Technologies Company Limited and Mazao Hub.

On Monday, September 7, 2026, the two companies signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) aimed at expanding access to locally manufactured agricultural drones, particularly among smallholder farmers.

Speaking after the signing, Mati Technologies Managing Director Benjamin Mollel said the company had been working with various farmer platforms to expand access to drone services and improve efficiency in agricultural production.

He said Mazao Hub reaches a large number of farmers through agricultural extension services and its agricultural inputs supply network, making it a strategic partner in expanding access to the technology.

‘Through this partnership, we aim to reach more than 100,000 farmers across the country by 2027,’ Mr Mollel said.

He said the use of drones could help farmers improve the efficiency of crop spraying and increase productivity.

Mazao Hub Public Relations Officer Alexandra Ngaiza said agricultural drones had traditionally been associated with large-scale farmers, but the partnership would make the technology more accessible to smallholder farmers through service-based models.

She said drones could improve the efficiency of crop spraying while reducing farmers’ direct exposure to agricultural chemicals compared with conventional spraying methods.

Mazao Hub is an agri-tech company that provides agricultural extension services and supplies inputs, connecting farmers with agricultural products and services.

Under the agreement, Mati Technologies’ locally manufactured drones will be made available to farmers through Mazao Hub’s existing network, with the two companies seeking to expand the use of technology in agricultural production.

Dar es Salaam. Four people were killed on Monday evening after an Abood passenger bus collided with a Toyota IST at Bunju Sokoni along Bagamoyo Road.

The accident occurred at about 7:40pm at Bunju Sokoni, Kinondoni District in Dar es Salaam.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, the Tanzania Police Force identified the bus as a Yutong, registration number T 235 EMJ, operated by Abood Bus Services.

Police identified the driver as Christivian Steven Shemuhilu, 38, a resident of Kange in Tanga Region.

The bus was travelling from Tegeta towards Bunju en route to Tanga when it collided with the Toyota IST, killing four people and damaging both vehicles.

Police officers and emergency responders attended the scene, removed the bodies and cleared the road as traffic built up following the crash.

The Dar es Salaam Special Police Zone said investigations were continuing to establish the cause of the accident.

I always believe that people present themselves differently depending on the location and the people they associate with at a given time.

Stella, in One for Sorrow, Two for Joy, is dumbfounded when she visits her mother’s workplace as her mother retires from her nursing job caring for premature babies. At work, Stella’s mother is loved and respected because she is smart, assertive and listened to.

At home, it is a different case altogether. Stella’s mum does nothing to protect herself or Stella from her abusive husband. Stella has become a punching bag for her father, and nobody does anything about it. But now that Stella has seen who her mother is at work, she can’t reconcile that woman with the mother who could not protect herself or her daughter.

‘Nurse Florence would have stood up to my dad. She wouldn’t have let him terrorise her life and mine.’

But life is more nuanced than that. There’s so much that goes on in one’s life and internal world that helps explain why people make the choices they make. Being in their shoes, we could make the same decisions or worse. The abuse was kept a secret because family is family, and you can’t let people know the family’s secrets.

School becomes a safe space for Stella. It is where she meets her three friends and starts to see that other children are living a different life from hers. That there are families where children are loved. Protected. Cared for, listened to and provided for.

Stella becomes a barrister. One who is capable but does not believe in herself. Imposter syndrome follows her into adulthood. She lives wondering when the other shoe is going to drop, especially when she sees one magpie because she associates it with bad things, while two Emagpies mean something joyful.

As she gets into her 30s, Stella grapples with the societal pressure of having ‘the one’ by age 30. She wills herself to lead a different life from her mother’s. She wants to find love that is the opposite. Safe. Romantic. Considerate.

Enter Christian.

If it feels too good to be true, it probably is. Christian was so good that I felt happy for Stella that she got to experience the love she had been craving her entire life.

‘My heart is full. The special thing that happens inside me when I meet Christian makes me long for my mum. I wish for her that she had known this feeling with my dad. I feel cheated that she didn’t.’

Sometimes we trust people too soon because deep down in our hearts we hope they are good for us. Because we desperately want them to be. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case for Stella.

It starts when they move in together. Small things at first. Then the red-coloured anger that Stella is too ashamed to believe could come from her Christian. That he would push her on the stairs. She is in so much denial that she can’t admit that she and her mum are the same after all. Because the Christian who made her delicious food, who made her smile, can’t be the same person who would do that to her.

I think this next thought process of Stella explains why people stay longer in abusive relationships in ways that don’t make sense to people on the outside: ‘If they know he slams the door on my face when he is angry… They will be distracted if I tell them those things… They will not think about how beautiful our children will be. Or how safe he can make me feel in his arms.’

This is the most confusing and hurtful place one can be in. Being hurt and loved by the same person. This sends Stella into the darkest depression, to the point where she cannot do her job, let alone get out of bed.

The author brings back the girls, as Stella calls her friends, to do exactly what friends do: rescue you when nobody else can. To bring you back to life because they love you too much to let you feel alone or not enough. I believe every woman needs a community of women who will give her the space to heal. To feel loved and considered when all else fails.

‘It’s not always going to feel like this, she promises. She loves me, and the girls love me. We will get through this together. I am not alone.’

One for Sorrow, Two for Joy is one of the saddest books I have read recently. The author tackles a tough topic with such care that it makes it easy to feel all the emotions the characters are feeling, especially Stella. I kept hoping she would somehow catch a break. If wishes were horses.

For students like Fadhili Saili, the journey to the world stage begins with a single tile. But for Tanzania, the journey represents something much bigger.

As Saili prepares to take his Wall and Floor Tiles skills beyond the national competition and towards the African stage, he represents a generation of young Tanzanians whose practical abilities could become part of the human capital needed to build the country’s economy over the next three decades.

His ambition is simple but significant.

‘I have performed well at the national level, and I know I can also do well in Africa. I pray that God will help me to perform well at the global level too,’ he says.

Saili first encountered Wall and Floor Tiles at school before choosing to pursue the field further at college. What began as a subject has become a practical skill, a professional pathway and now a platform from which he hopes to compete internationally.

He is among the young Tanzanians selected through the national skills competition to represent the country at WorldSkills Africa.

His story, however, is not just about one young man hoping to win a competition. It is about a much bigger question facing Tanzania: if the country is serious about becoming a competitive, industrialised and technology-driven economy by 2050, who will build it?

The answer will depend on millions of skilled people.

Electricians will be needed to install and maintain modern energy systems. Welders will fabricate equipment and infrastructure.

Technicians will operate increasingly sophisticated machinery. Construction specialists will build homes, factories, roads and other infrastructure. Digital specialists will develop and maintain the systems that will increasingly underpin businesses and public services.

This is why Tanzania’s growing investment in skills competitions matters. The medals are important, but they are not the ultimate prize.

The bigger prize is a workforce that can turn knowledge into production, technology into solutions and training into economic value.

A competition with a bigger purpose

Tanzania’s 2026 WorldSkills journey began with zonal competitions in June before moving to the national stage during the National Education, Skills and Innovation Week in Tanga in August.

Young people competed in areas including Wall and Floor Tiling, Electrical Installation, Welding and Metal Fabrication, Cooking, Fashion Technology, Computer-Aided Design, Mechatronics, Internet of Things and Beauty Therapy.

The best performers have now earned the opportunity to represent Tanzania at the African level.

Seen narrowly, this is a competition. Seen from the perspective of national development, however, it is a mechanism for identifying talent, testing competence and exposing young people to standards against which their skills can be measured internationally.

That distinction is important.

For NACTVET Director of Quality Assurance, Dr Jofrey Oleke, skills development is inseparable from national development.

His message is that Tanzania cannot achieve its development ambitions without a workforce with the practical competencies required to drive different sectors of the economy.

‘Without skills, no country can develop,’ he says.

That principle places WorldSkills within a much broader national agenda.

Preparing the workforce before 2050 arrives

Tanzania’s Development Vision 2050 places human capital at the centre of the country’s ambition to become a strong, inclusive and competitive economy.

That ambition has major implications for education.

The country cannot wait until 2049 to discover that it does not have enough technicians, engineers, digital specialists, artisans, entrepreneurs and other professionals capable of supporting the economy it wants.

The workforce has to be built now.

This explains the growing emphasis on skills across Tanzania’s education and training system, including changes in curricula, expansion of technical and vocational education and training, competence-based learning, skills recognition and stronger links between education providers and employers.

The Education and Training Policy 2014, 2023 Edition, reinforces the need for an education system that produces citizens with knowledge, skills and competencies relevant to national development.

Vision 2050 takes that ambition further by placing greater emphasis on science, technology, innovation, digital capability, adaptability, entrepreneurship and lifelong learning.

For Tanzania, this is particularly important as the economy changes.

‘The jobs of tomorrow will not necessarily look like those of today,’ says education expert, Dr Thomas Jabir.

He adds that automation, artificial intelligence, digitalisation, advanced manufacturing, renewable energy and new technologies are changing workplaces across the world.

‘A workforce prepared only for yesterday’s economy will struggle to deliver tomorrow’s,’ he notes.

This is where the government’s effort to bring industry closer to education becomes critical.

Education Minister Prof Adolf Mkenda has repeatedly stressed the need for education and training institutions ‘to work more closely with industry so that what is taught reflects what the economy requires.’

The principle behind the approach is straightforward: education providers and industry should not operate as separate worlds.

They need to plan together, identify skills gaps together and develop training that responds to those gaps.

For an economy seeking to industrialise, that gap can be costly.

Vocational education expert Dr Amos Tabu argues that skills competitions should be understood within this wider transformation.

In his view, initiatives such as WorldSkills become more meaningful when connected to the reforms taking place across education, vocational training, science and technology and industry.

‘The competition can identify high-performing young people, but its deeper value comes when the lessons from those competitors are fed back into training institutions,’ he argues.

If a competitor performs to an international standard, the question should not only be how to help that individual win.

The question he suggests should also be: what can the rest of the training system learn from that performance? ‘That is where competition becomes system improvement.’

NACTVET and the architecture of skills

NACTVET has a particularly important role in this journey.

As the regulator and coordinator of technical and vocational education and training, it sits at the centre of efforts to improve quality, relevance and standards across the TVET system.

Its responsibility goes beyond registering institutions. It includes quality assurance, regulation and helping shape a TVET system capable of responding to changing labour-market and technological demands.

The council’s competence-based approach is especially relevant.

‘WorldSkills reinforces this philosophy by placing competitors in situations where they must demonstrate their competence against defined standards, often under pressure and within strict time limits,’ says Dr Oleke.

Tanzania’s membership of WorldSkills Africa adds an international dimension to the process. It allows the country to compare its skills development approach with other countries, exchange expertise and expose young people and trainers to broader standards.

That exposure matters because Tanzania is not preparing its workforce only for the domestic market.

Saili’s ambition to progress from Tanzania to Africa and eventually the global stage captures that reality.

The role of vocational education becomes even more important when viewed through Tanzania’s industrial ambitions.

VETA specialised educator Ms Janeth Mvura sees vocational education as one of the foundations upon which an industrial economy must be built.

‘An industrial economy needs people who can install machinery, operate production lines, maintain equipment, construct buildings, repair systems and ensure that technology works in practice,’ she says.

That makes vocational education a strategic component of industrialisation.

‘It should therefore not be viewed as a pathway for students who could not pursue academic education and the government’s efforts should be appreciated and supported,’ she observes.

Beyond the winners

This is perhaps the most important test facing Tanzania’s skills competition. What happens after the certificates and medals?

Dr Jabir believes that if the winners receive further coaching, modern equipment, industry mentorship and opportunities to compete internationally, they can become ambassadors for Tanzanian skills.

But their greatest value could be even broader.

‘They can become examples to other young people that practical competence is a source of opportunity, dignity and international competitiveness,’ he notes.

Experts believe that through the competition, the government and training institutions can also use the competition to identify weaknesses in curricula, equipment, teaching methods and assessment.

Tanzania’s skills agenda is ultimately about preparing people for an economy that does not yet fully exist.

Dar es Salaam. Tanzania needs a permanent national reconciliation commission to identify political tensions early and help resolve them before they escalate into crises, former Zanzibar First Vice President and ACT-Wazalendo chairman Othman Masoud Othman has said.

Mr Othman made the proposal on Tuesday, September 8, 2026, while speaking at the National Stakeholders Conference to reflect on the country’s political situation, the 2025 General Election and the nation’s future.

Drawing on Zanzibar’s experience of political tensions and reconciliation efforts, Mr Othman said Tanzania should move away from a system in which dialogue is initiated only after political disagreements have already developed into serious disputes.

‘We should have a national commission instead of doing things only after a problem has happened, then calling each other, meeting and running around,’ he said.

He said such a body should operate permanently, monitoring political developments and providing recommendations on how emerging problems could be addressed before they become more difficult to resolve.

‘It is better to have a body that can, every day, provide recommendations on how to correct things before they are damaged and escalate into something worse,’ he said.

Mr Othman said Zanzibar’s political history showed why preventive mechanisms could be useful in managing tensions, particularly during electoral periods.

He said political disagreements could emerge when parties and institutions responsible for managing elections move from cooperation to confrontation.

‘Many times a problem happens during an election. Instead of parties cooperating with the electoral commission and perhaps the registrar’s office, you start having disagreements,’ he said.

According to Mr Othman, establishing a permanent reconciliation mechanism would provide an institutional avenue for addressing such disagreements before they develop into wider political conflicts.

He cited Zanzibar’s experience even before Zanzibar Revolution, following the political disturbances of 1961, saying recommendations made at the time included establishing a committee to address political problems.

Mr Othman said the committee was established and played a role in improving the political environment ahead of the 1963 election.

‘We have taken the experience that after those disturbances in 1961 in Zanzibar, one of the recommendations was to establish such a committee, and it was established and worked well,’ he said.

For Mr Othman, that experience provides a basis for considering a similar permanent mechanism at national level, with the emphasis placed on prevention rather than waiting for political crises to occur.

Mr Othman also argued that effective oversight would be critical to ensuring political reforms deliver lasting results.

‘One of the biggest problems we have is the absence of accountability. We have that problem even before revolution of Zanzibar and independence of Tanganyika,’ he said, pointing to Parliament, the House of Representatives, the media, academic institutions, the judiciary and civil society as important oversight institutions.

He warned that without stronger oversight, political agreements alone might not prevent the country from returning to the same problems.

‘Without oversight, we are here and we could go even further in the wrong direction,’ he said.

He said the proposed commission would therefore be part of a broader effort to institutionalise dialogue and early intervention, rather than relying on temporary negotiations whenever political tensions rise.

A few years ago, I wrote about the difficult transition from colleague to manager. I focused on the person who had just been promoted, the awkwardness of leading former peers, navigating friendships and learning to balance authority with empathy.

But there is the other side to that story I was reminded of as I overheard a rant at a friend’s gathering. A guest shared his experience of how his friend has changed after being promoted, leaving a fracture in place of their strong friendship. Now he believes his friend has changed and he wonders if he has lost a friendship.

You might be able to relate to him and today, I want to speak to the friend who feels they’ve lost their friendship to a promotion. The friend who suddenly finds themselves reporting to someone they used to gossip with over lunch, vent to after difficult meetings, and laugh with on the drive home.

For many people, the first reaction is disappointment. “She thinks she’s better than me.” “They’ve changed.”

What can feel like distance or arrogance from one side may simply be someone trying to navigate a role that no longer allows them to show up in the same way they once did. That shift can feel personal when you’re on the receiving end of it. The friend who used to overlook your lateness now asks why you’re late. We expect our friendships to remain frozen in time while our careers move forward. I want to offer another perspective.

Consider this: perhaps true friendship isn’t measured by how many favours someone can do for us once they become our boss. Perhaps it is measured by whether we can celebrate their growth without expecting privileged access to it.

It is easy to applaud someone’s promotion. It is much harder to accept everything that promotion asks of them.

Of course, not every new manager handles the transition well. Some become distant. Others swing too far in the opposite direction, becoming unusually strict because they are determined to prove they aren’t playing favourites. Leadership is a skill, not an instinct, and like every skill, it takes time to develop. New leaders will make mistakes.

AND friends make mistakes too.

Sometimes we hold people hostage to the version of themselves that made us comfortable. We expect yesterday’s relationship to operate under today’s responsibilities. We ask for exceptions because “we’ve always done it this way.” We expect inside information because we once shared everything. We quietly believe that our history together should outweigh the expectations of their new role.

Without realising it, we place them in an impossible position. We ask them to choose between being a good friend and being a good leader. The healthiest leaders refuse to make that choice and the healthiest friends don’t ask them to.

If your friend has just become your manager, one of the greatest gifts you can offer them is the freedom to grow into the person the role requires them to become. Respect the boundaries they are trying to build. Trust that professionalism is not the absence of friendship; it is often the protection of it.

Don’t measure your friendship by the privileges you’ve lost, instead measure the respect you’ve managed to preserve. The friendships that survive promotions are the ones mature enough to understand that everything changes, but it doesn’t have to diminish love, loyalty, or trust. In many ways, promotions don’t destroy friendships, they reveal them.

So, if you’ve caught yourself saying, “My friend has changed,” pause before you decide that’s a bad thing. Ask yourself a different question.

Dar es Salaam. Tanzania will host the first Women’s Parliamentary Conference (WPC) in November, bringing together women parliamentarians, male parliamentary champions of gender equality, policymakers, civil society, development partners and other stakeholders from the Great Lakes Region to develop a common agenda on peace, security and inclusive development.

The conference, organised by the Forum of Parliaments of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (FP-ICGLR) in collaboration with the Parliament of Tanzania, will be held from November 2 to 5 at the Julius Nyerere International Convention Centre in Dar es Salaam.

About 250 participants from the 12 ICGLR member states are expected to attend.

The conference comes as the Great Lakes Region continues to face challenges including conflict, displacement, armed group activity, poverty and competition over natural resources-issues that cross national borders and require coordinated regional responses.

The FP-ICGLR was established in 2008 as the parliamentary arm of the ICGLR, which was created in response to conflicts that affected the region during the 1990s and early 2000s.

The Forum seeks to translate regional commitments on peace, security, democracy, governance, development and integration into national legislation, policies and action.

Its Secretary General, Ambassador Dr Deo Osmund Mwapinga, is the first Tanzanian to hold the position.

‘Your participation offers an opportunity to contribute your voice, expertise and ideas to the regional agenda for action,’ Ambassador Mwapinga said, inviting stakeholders to participate in the conference.

He said the gathering would provide an opportunity to turn shared regional commitments into practical action benefiting women, communities and future generations.

Tanzania’s selection as host reflects its longstanding contribution to regional peace efforts and its experience in women’s political leadership.

The country has had women serve in key parliamentary positions, including Anne Makinda, who became the first woman to serve as Speaker of the National Assembly in 2010. Dr Tulia Ackson became Speaker in 2022 and later served as President of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), becoming the first Tanzanian to lead the global organisation of national parliaments.

President Hassan, Tanzania’s first female Head of State, also represents the country’s experience with women in senior public leadership.

The conference will focus on strengthening women’s participation and influence in parliamentary decision-making, peace and security and sustainable development.

According to the IPU, women accounted for an average of 28 percent of parliamentarians in the Great Lakes Region as of July 2025, highlighting the continuing gap in women’s representation in political decision-making.

The conference will provide women parliamentarians with a platform to share experiences, build alliances and develop joint legislative and policy responses to regional challenges.

Its significance goes beyond increasing the number of women in parliament. It is also intended to strengthen women’s influence over decisions affecting peace, security and development.

Parliamentary diplomacy will be central to the discussions, providing legislators from different countries with an avenue to maintain dialogue, build trust and promote common responses to challenges that affect the region.

Civil society organisations, researchers, development partners, young leaders and private-sector representatives are also expected to participate through discussions, exhibitions and side events.

Ambassador Mwapinga said the conference should help connect regional commitments with practical policies and initiatives.

‘We invite you to join us in Tanzania to help turn our shared commitments into meaningful change for women, communities and future generations,’ he said.

The conference will be held from November 2 to 5 at the Julius Nyerere International Convention Centre in Dar es Salaam.