Transparency and Accountability in Tanzanian Petroleum Industry: The Role of Institutions and Challenges Associated

Abstract

The petroleum industry is among the key sectors currently growing in Tanzania and contributing to the country's economic development. It needs precise regulation and management for sustainable development; in achieving that, it is essential to ensure that the setup of institutions responsible for the sector do facilitate transparency and accountability principles. The article analyses the setup of the said institutions and identify challenges hindering performance of its role in ensuring realization of the principles, in the end it provides a way out in having framework that realize the principles. Laws and scholarly works were reviewed in the analysis, direct information from personnel in the institutions also forms part of the findings, which reveals that a number on institutions are established and tasked with different roles in management of the sector, however, despite the commendable efforts, the institutions fail to facilitate realization of the principles due to several challenges including lacking independence and autonomy, limited access to petroleum information, and no specific roles assigned to some of the institutions in relation to the principles. Hence, to tackle the challenges, the article recommends assurance of autonomy, independency to the institutions and setting clear roles for each of them to perform