ALL is not well at the Tanzania National Roads Agency (TANROADS) as the government continues to lose billions of shillings as a result of decisions made by the agency’s CEO contrary to procedure and government regulations and without prior approval of the board of directors and the parent ministry.

This state of affairs affects operations at the state-run agency which is tasked with managing a network of around 30,000 kilometres of trunk and regional roads in mainland Tanzania.

It is claimed that the agency’s operations are frequently being disrupted by "arbitrary decisions" made by the CEO, Ephraim Mrema.

It would be recalled that the very hiring of Mrema was questioned in Parliament in 2008 after a legislator asserted that the TANROADS CEO was not competent for the job and his appointment had been improper.

Even findings of a special committee formed by the Minister for Infrastructure Development, Dr Shukuru Kawambwa, to ascertain the authenticity of the claims by the legislator, clearly showed that the current TANROADS boss was appointed to the position irregularly.

Since then, many questions have been asked about the process that led to the initial hiring of Mrema as TANROADS CEO, whose tenure in the position has of late become marred by much a lot of controversy.

One wonders, for example, why Mrema signed up for a five-year renewable contract on June 4, 2007, contrary to the maximum three-year period specified in his appointment letter and in newspaper advertisements for the post.
 
Committee findings report shows that Mrema was appointed after being vetted by a “search committee” in a secretive manner after the recruiting exercise had been hijacked from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), which was initially commissioned to conduct the search.

We are told that Mrema did not meet any of the four selection criteria as advertised in local newspapers in 2006, including the requirement that applicants should be post-graduate degree holders in civil engineering, transport economics, or highway engineering, as well as having undergone training in management, according to the report.

In addition, the committee also found that Mrema had neither the minimum 20 years experience in road sector operations nor 10 years of successful performance at management level, as stipulated in the advert. Mrema is a quantity surveyor by profession.

Since he did not meet any of the selection criteria, PWC did not endorse his name during the initial vetting process, only to later be overruled by the “search committee”, according to the report.

There have also been concerns that the government is losing billions of shillings each month from paying controversial fees to construction companies under contract with TANROADS after the contractors jumped the gun by mobilizing equipment and other resources to road construction sites before the funds allocated by the government for the projects were made available.

Again, this is the CEO who had the audacity to institute controversial staff changes at TANROADS without following proper authorising channels and went on to claim that it was the President himself who sanctioned his actions. State House has since refuted the claims by Mrema that President Kikwete summoned him and approved the staff changes at TANROADS. This is gross insubordination which must be punished forthwith!

How can the government continue to embrace a chief executive who deliberately breaks the law by acting contrary to the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) Act?

We are concerned by these developments at the state-run agency which threaten to cause even bigger losses to the government and weaken the country’s economy.

It is for this reason that we would like to call upon the appointing authority to take immediate administrative measures, including to nullify the appointment of Mrema so as to preserve the integrity of the government.