Rural Cooperation: In The Cooperative Movement in Tanzania

6. The Abolition of The Farmers’ Marketing Cooperatives

6 The Abolition of The Farmers’ Marketing Cooperatives 66 Rural Cooperation: In The Cooperative Movement in Tanzania This chapter analyzes the decline and eventual abolition of farmers’ marketing cooperatives which were registered using the Cooperative Societies Act, 1968. The villages and Ujamaa villages as the basic units of cooperation are analyzed, followed by a discussion of the problems which marketing cooperatives faced, and of the government decision to abolish the marketing cooperative unions and their affiliated primary cooperative societies, which were operating in the villages registered under the Villages and Ujamaa Villages Act, 1975. 6.1 Villages as Basic Units of Cooperation The government enacted the Villages and Ujamaa Villages Act, 1975 in order to speed up the socialist transformation process in rural areas and register the villages and Ujamaa villages under the Villages Act, 1975. Registered villages were recognized by the Villages Act, 1975, to function as multi-purpose primary cooperative societies. A village was an administrative and political entity with its own government. The Villages and Ujamaa villages Act, 1975 recognized villages at two stages. In the first stage, a village was registered under the Act. Village registration was carried out when the registrar of villages was satisfied that not less than 250 households or family units had settled there and made their homes within an area of Tanganyika and that the boundaries of such an area could be defined (Villages and Ujamaa Villages Act, 1975 Section 4). Under this Act: A village and its various organs shall perform their functions as if the village were a multi-purpose cooperative society; provided that the provisions of the cooperative societies act 1968 or of any subsidiary legislation there under shall not apply to a village or to anyorganthereof(VillagesandUjamaaVillagesAct,1975section13). The Villages Act stated members of Village Assembly as follows: “Every person who was a resident in the village and had attained the age of 18 years was considered a member of the Village Assembly” (Villages and Ujamaa Villages Act 1975 Section 5 Sub-section 2). The Act stated that its objectives and reasons were for the registration, designation and administration of villages and Ujamaa villages. In spite of this declaration, this Act directed villages and their various organs to perform their functions as if the villages were multi-purpose cooperative societies. However, there were no rules or guiding principles in the Villages Act of 1975 as to how villages were to function as cooperatives (United Republic of Tanzania 1981). There was no cooperative setting outside the village government. The termination of the application of Chapter Six 67 the Cooperative Societies Act, 1968 on villages, and the passing of the Villages and Ujamaa Villages Act, 1975 with no cooperative details in the Act posed a problem of different interpretation of how villages were to function as cooperatives. The Prime Minister’s report on the Villages and Ujamaa Village Act, 1975 gave details of the cooperative content in the villages (Ofisi ya Waziri Mkuu na Makamu wa Pili wa Rais, 1975). The Prime Minister’s report said that, in the first stage when a village was registered, a peasant could have his or her farm, but that farm machinery would belong to the village cooperative. Likewise, other village requirements like seeds, fertilizers, and expertise would be obtained through the village cooperative. In the second stage, a village was designated as an Ujamaa village. This could happen, Where in relation to any village the Regional Party committee was satisfied that a substantial portion of economic activities of the village were being undertaken and carried out on a communal basis, the Regional committee would recommend to the Minister to designate the village as an Ujamaa village (Villages and Ujamaa villages Act, 1975 Section 16). The Act, 1975 did not define what it meant by the term ‘substantial portion,’ and left it to the discretion of Regional Party Committees (of the TANU. Party). Villages registered under the Villages and Ujamaa villages Act,1975weredeemedtofunctionasmulti-purposecooperativesocieties. Cooperative Societies which were registered under the Cooperative Societies Act, 1968 were not allowed to operate in a registered village. This resulted in decline of cooperative practice in villages. 6.2 Abolition of Farmers’ Marketing Cooperatives As a result of the restructuring of cooperatives in accordance with the Villages and Ujamaa villages Act, 1975 the TANU Party directed the government that the structure of the whole cooperative movement had to change to accommodate the changes that had...