20101103
Daily News

CHAMA Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) said on Tuesday it had retained 78.24 per cent of the constituent seats in parliament after losing 51 to the opposition and declared that it accepted the results.

The party's campaign Manager, Mr Abdulrahman Kinana, said in Dar es Salaam that their computations showed they had retained 188 of the 239 constituent seats, losing 29 on the mainland and 22 seats in Zanzibar.

"That is largely what we anticipated. We estimated that there would be a very tough battle in 28 constituencies (on the mainland)," he explained, adding that CCM members can be proud of the results.

Mr Kinana said the outcome reflected the electorate's growing awareness of their democratic right to vote for leaders of their choice, but was fuelled by internal conflicts and dissent among aspirants ejected under the new primary nomination process involving all party members.

The system was introduced to broaden democracy in CCM primaries and curb corrupt practices experienced in the past, but it was bitterly opposed by those who were dropped.

The campaign manager said some of the dissenters were reconciled but others carried forward the conflicts to the campaign and voting. A number of dropped aspirants were accused of campaigning for opposition candidates.

"We may also have been punished in some cases for fielding candidates who were not preferred by the electorate," he conceded.

Citizen

An elderly woman cast her vote in Sunday's polls.

The opposition has lost the Tarime seat to CCM but retained five previous seats and grabbed 24 new ones, including those regained by the ruling party in 2005 in Vunjo, Hai and Kigoma South.

The new seats include Ubungo and Kawe in Dar es Salaam; Nyamagana and Ilemela in Mwanza; Iringa urban, Mbulu, Lindi urban, Mbeya urban, Rombo, two Maswa constituencies, Mbeya urban and Kilwa South.

Mr Kinana said the results would be high on the agenda of the next meetings of the CCM Central Committee (CC) and National Executive Committee (NEC).

Meanwhile, the CCM presidential campaign Manager has commended Dr Ali Mohamed Shein for winning the presidential race in Zanzibar and Seif Sharif Hamad for conceding results.