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Government spokespersons welcome
2008-05-15 09:22:22
By Editor
The recent appointment of government spokespersons deserves a warm welcome. This arises from the fact that a breakdown of communication between the government authorities and members of the public is not good for society.
The media is the communication vessel that facilitates this interaction, and it is therefore encouraging that this long-standing `official silence` that has characterized the operations of government bureaucrats may be coming to an end.
What government leaders and bureaucrats do is to serve the nation in their various capacities.
It is naturally expected that their employer-the people-would be interested to know at any given point how they are undertaking the work entrusted to them.
There is no employer who would willingly allow himself to be kept in the dark as to how his employees are faring and if they are meeting the set targets agreed upon.
In many developing countries, and also in some developed states, transparency of government operations has been quite difficult because many top bureaucrats have got a lot of skeletons in the cupboard.
Given that background, it is quite encouraging that in Tanzania, the government has shown keenness in having a close relationship with the media.
There are several examples like the President`s routine meetings with press corps, the Prime Minister recently met with editors in Dar es Salaam, while some few ministers have also availed themselves to meetings with media personnel during which burning issues have been discussed.
Much as the situation is commendable, the greater numbers of top bureaucrats and government leaders have been reluctant to cooperate with the media and have at times treated them as enemies.
Their predicament has manifested itself in their nervousness which mainly stems from the fact that the press has been in the forefront in revealing the embezzlement of public funds, which has led to the resignation of several cabinet ministers.
However, the recent appointment of government spokespersons indicates that the top leaders of this country are for transparency.
We therefore hope that the ministry spokespersons will not serve as articulate speakers who are expert at concealing the truth by playing with words.
It is also our hope that it will be understood that the nature of their work demands that they be conversant with all that is going on in their ministries and that they have to have access to all key information, otherwise their recent appointment will serve no good purpose.
As for those bureaucrats who may want to resist the need to operate transparently, we advise them to read the signs of the time and accept the fact that the era of playing with public funds is approaching a dead end.
Anybody who has been entrusted to serve the Tanzanian public should no longer hide any information of public interest for selfish reasons.
In fact the improvement of communication between the media people and civil servants will ease a lot of the burden on the backs of government bureaucrats because the execution of many of their tasks is difficult precisely because the wananchi have been kept in the dark.
Finally, we urge the newly-appointed government spokespersons to avoid spin-doctoring and using \'newspeak\' as a vehicle of communication.
We wish them all the best.
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