Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) deputy chairman (Mainland) Pius Msekwa has decried arbitrary use of force by state organs against opponents saying it is detrimental to the country's political development.

The long time politician, who doubles as the chairman of the Tanzania Centre for Democracy (TCD), was delivering a key note speech to mark the International Democracy Day at the TCD grounds in Mikocheni yesterday.

He admitted that there were people in the country using the organs arbitrarily to suppress independent thinking.

"It is strange to find that up to now, 17 years since we re-adopted political pluralism, there are people who are not ready to accept political opponents," he said.

Elaborating, he explained that such attitudes were not completely new in the country. He said even during the single party era there were some intelligence officers who thought their only duty was to hover over the lives of politicians.

"I grew up in a culture in which some intelligence officers thought that they had a duty to count even the number of beer bottles I was taking in a bar. This was wrong as it created a state of fear unnecessarily," he said.

Mr Msekwa urged all political actors to adapt the culture of political tolerance by welcoming alternative opinions.

He said one major problem facing the development of democracy in the country was to think that democracy could be limited to the notion of voting and being voted for. But this was wrong and has negative connotations, he said.

"It is wrong to think that democracy could be limited to that process of voting and being voted for; rather it is a long process. It must be reflected in the people's daily lives," he said.

Mr Msekwa said current trends indicate that the country's democratic growth was being hampered.

He said newly established political parties have for quite sometime failed to make a significant impact, a fact that has made some people lose hope with the country's opposition.

He further said this was not new as it had occurred early in the 1960s before the country became a single party state.

He recalled that it was a well-known fact then that whoever would vie for a political post through the ruling party the Tanganyika African National Union (Tanu) would automatically snatch the post.

It was under such circumstances that the founding father of the nation, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, opted for plural politics as a way of allowing more democracy through a genuine intra-party competition, he pointed out.

This exercise, according to Mr Msekwa, was successful because two of the then political heavyweights, Mr Paul Bomani and Bibi Titi Mohamed, who had played a significant role during the independent struggle, were defeated by their challengers.

He said under the current political environment, where one party has remained very dominant in power, there was a possibility that there are people who beat competent candidates simply because they are contesting through the CCM ticket while their opponents are in the opposition.

Recalling what transpired when the famous Chief Justice Nyalali was gathering comments around the country, he said his commission proved that many people lacked political awareness.

"Many people said no to multi-partism, and to me that was fear of the unknown," he said.

Mr Msekwa is one of the ruling party's think tanks and his views could be an indication of coming to times of openness and transparency after so many years of 'party discipline' in which such statements were delivered within closed doors.

This is the second time that Mr Msekwa has delivered such strong statements outside the party milieu. The first time was after the Tarime by-election when he issued a statement decrying misuse of funds during the by-election.

He cited the Tarime case where both CCM and the opposition Chama cha Demokrasia (Chadema) used helicopters for campaigns, an exercise that Mr Msekwa said was diverting funds from other useful expenditure.