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Ex-RC Ditopile Mzuzuri is dead
2008-04-21 10:42:22
By Njonanje Samwel
A former deputy minister and regional commissioner, Ukiwaona Ditopile Mzuzuri, has died. He died yesterday morning at Hilux Hotel in Morogoro, where he was on a business tour.
Morogoro Regional Commissioner Said Kalembo said in a telephone interview with The Guardian yesterday afternoon that Ditopile (60) died while watching television in his room with his wife.
The RC said he was notified of the death by the Morogoro Regional Medical Officer, whose name was
given as Meshack Massi.
``I received a phone call from the RMO (regional medical officer) this morning notifying me that Ditopile is no more,`` Kalembo said.
``I was shocked by the sad news because Ditopile called me on Friday informing that he would be visiting Morogoro and, while in here, he would like to meet me,`` he added.
Ditopile resigned as Tabora RC in 2006 following the manslaughter charges he was facing.
Until his death, he was understood to be engaged in honey business but it was not immediately known whether that explained his Morogoro tour.
The manslaughter charges were in connection with the fatal shooting of a commuter bus (daladala) driver in Dar es Salaam on November 4, 2006.
RC Kalembo said he had arranged to have an audience with Ditopile “at some stage yesterday but that has been sadly disrupted by his sudden death``.
Elaborating, he said: ``His wife told us that while they were watching TV, he suddenly fell unconscious. She tried to shake him to find out whether he had inexplicably fallen asleep but it was all cold and quiet.``
``She then asked the hotel``s staff to call a doctor. However, by the time the doctor (RMO Massi) arrived at the scene Ditopile was already dead,`` added the RC.
Dr Massi explained that he responded ``very swiftly`` to the emergency call by the hotel`s staff and confirmed that he found Ditopile already dead. He gave the time of the death as 9:00am.
He said the cause of the death has not been established ``but that should be known after a postmortem if members of his family request that it be conducted`.
Ditopile served as Transport and Communication deputy
minister in the second phase (Ali Hassan Mwinyi) government and was at different times after that RC for Dar es Salaam, Lindi and Tabora.
He was first charged with murder but the prosecution later downgraded that to manslaughter after he had spent some months in remand prison.
While still facing the manslaughter charge, he was released from remand prison on bail in circumstances widely described as controversial, suspicious, illegal, discriminatory and unprecedented.
His release touched off chaos in prisons in different parts of the country, with inmates boycotting court sessions to protest the way the government had handled his case. He has died while still out on bail.
A senior editor with The Guardian said yesterday he and Ditopile were in the same camp during their six-month mandatory National Service stint in early 1970, later joining the University of Dar es Salaam in July 1970 and graduating together with a BA (Hons) in mid-March 1973.
They then went in different directions, with Ditopile preoccupying himself with politics as a ruling party (TANU and later CCM) cadre. He has died a retired army officer with the rank of captain.
Meanwhile, Chama Cha Mapinduzi Publicity Secretary John Chiligati has expressed deep shock and grief at the news of Ditopile`s sudden death “because he was not ill``.
He said Ditopile joined CCM in 1974 and was loyal to the party throughout, adding: ``He served the party in various positions, including those of deputy secretary general and district party secretary. The party has lost a crucial figure.``
Hamad Rashid Mohamed, Leader of the Official Opposition in the National Assembly, said the news of Ditopile`s death ``has shocked me and my party – the opposition Civic United Front``.
``I had known Ukiwaona Ditopile Mzuzuri since the 1980s when both of us were members of the ruling CCM`s National Executive Council (NEC). I knew him as a good friend and an industrious and enterprising man loyal to both the government and Tanzanians,`` he observed.
Mohamed explained that although Ditopile was later to encounter problems after the November 4, 2006 incident, ``the public should now forgive him for all that and learn from the good things he did during his lifetime``.
The former RC`s body is lying at the Morogoro Regional Hospital mortuary pending the completion of funeral arrangements, details of which were still sketchy by the time we went to press last night.
Some reports said the body would be transported to Dar es Salaam yesterday evening before last respects are paid at his Mfaume Street residence this morning.
It would thereafter be moved to Kinyerezi, on the city`s outskirts, for burial later tomorrow.
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