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Nyerere: A tribute to a statesman
2008-10-12 12:52:14
By Hashim Ismail
Julius Kambarage Nyerere, this country`s first president and Father of the Nation, died in a London hospital on October 14, 1999. For more than two decades he was the most outstanding political figure in Africa.
Tanzania, Africa and the world mourned his death in a manner befitting his status as a statesman and a selfless leader untainted by greed or self-aggrandisement.
It is difficult to find the words to describe the sheer spectacle of the mourning in Tanzania.
Nyerere was buried with full national honours at his birthplace, Butiama village.
He was born the son of a tribal chief of a small Tanzanian tribe, the Zanaki, in Mara Region, northwest Tanzania.
Starting from a small school in Musoma, he gained a place in Tabora Boys School, one of the few prestigious schools at the time in the then Tanganyika Trusteeship Territory under British rule.
After that he proceeded to Makerere College where he qualified as a teacher.
Later, he was awarded a scholarship to study history and economics at Edinburgh University in the United Kingdom, where he graduated with an MA in the early 1950s.
After a brief period as a teacher at a Catholic Missionary School, the then St Francis College, Pugu, Nyerere resigned to form a political party - the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU). He was the undisputed and able leader of the party through which Tanganyika attained its independence on December 9, 1961.
Nyerere became the new nation`s prime minister, but soon resigned from that position so as to devote more time to strengthening the political party - TANU.
Rashidi Kawawa became the prime minister. However, Nyerere was in December 1962 elected the president of Tanganyika, which in 1964 merged with Zanzibar to form the United Republic of Tanzania. Fondly referred to as Mwalimu, Nyerere remained in power for 24 years until his retirement in 1985.
I had the privilege of meeting Nyerere in 1959 at a Rotary Club lunch in Moshi, a town at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro.
I was a school teacher and a Town Councillor in Moshi, and had been invited to talk to the Rotarians at their weekly lunch meeting at the Livingstone Hotel, which later changed name to Moshi Hotel.
But the Rotarians, having learned that Nyerere was in town, invited him to the lunch and also to address the meeting (instead of me).
Of course, each of us had a few minutes to talk to him before lunch, and when I told him that I was Zanzibari he was rather interested.
When the time arrived for the speech, he declined to speak and insisted that the designated guest speaker go ahead to speak as planned.
He said: ``Let us hear this Mswahili speak.`` And of course, I went on to address the meeting.
I must recall and admit that his gesture on that day, apart from making me feel honoured, left a permanent mark of his humility and modesty on all of us gathered there.
In 1959, Nyerere was neither the President of Tanganyika nor did he hold any official position in the government but to all intents and purposes he was the recognised, undisputed de facto leader of an independent Tanzania.
Julius Nyerere won independence for Tanganyika and ascended to power without a single shot being fired.
He kept clear of confrontation with the British and was always one step ahead of them.
So when the British put forward a proposal for the first multi-party elections on adult suffrage (not universal), the elections were going to be held under what was known as `the tripartite system`.
That is the three races (African, Asian and European) were going to be represented equally - not proportionally -in the legislature!
Each of the constituencies - the administrative regions - would return three members, one from each of the races.
Since there were hardly 10,000 whites and 300,000 Indians in a population of 10 million, this system was unjust, iniquitous and highly provocative.
As a matter of fact, the acceptance of this formula by Nyerere resulted in a split in the TANU party and a new party was formed by the dissidents - which is exactly what the colonial administration had wished to happen!
Nyerere toured the country to explain to the people why he accepted the proposal, unfair though it was. I recall a public meeting in Majengo in Moshi at which he explained it in this way:
``It is like dealing with someone very powerful who has taken your 100 head of cattle.
You demand to have your cattle back and he gives only ten and tells you to get lost.
You take those ten and come back for more later until you have recovered your rightful property.``
Second, under the tripartite system of a more division of seats in the legislature he had no doubt that all those returned (African, Asians and Europeans) would be his supporters anyway! So he really beat the powers that be at their own game.
Consequently, Nyerere won Independence for Tanganyika in a short period of six years. I can recall only three of what might be termed political trials -otherwise the hallmark of most independence movements and struggles.
Nyerere himself was charged with sedition, tried and acquitted.
In another case one of his close aides, Issack Bhoke Munanka, was imprisoned for trying to recruit civil servants into the political party TANU.
In a third case, two Tanganyikan journalists, Kheri Baghdelelh and Robert Makange were imprisoned for sedition.
For half a century, we have known Nyerere as our leader, Mwalimu (teacher) and Father of the Nation.
We have known him as indefatigable campaigner for independence and our president for 24 years.
After his voluntary retirement he remained very much a player in the field.
In fact, in Tanzania and on the international scene, he seemed to enjoy greater prestige and admiration during his retirement until his death.
Mwalimu was a thinker, a philosopher king and a campaigner for the oppressed of Africa.
He distinguished himself from other leaders in Africa by his ability to remain in power and to maintain peace while other founding fathers of the African continent were overthrown by the military or assassinated.
Nyerere enjoyed a relatively peaceful tenure of office as President of Tanzania and passed on the leadership to his successors in an orderly and smooth manner.
Nyerere indeed was the man behind the peace that is Tanzania. It didn`t just come about on its own. We Tanzanian accepted his call and responded to it.
Tanzania had to make tremendous sacrifices to abide by the leadership. I sometimes feel that peace was squandered and not used for the full benefit of Tanzanians. Charity did not begin at home.
Nyerere was human and I am sure he silently endured many unhappy episodes: the post-revolutionary situation in Zanzibar is one of them.
I cannot forget the day I read in the TANU party newspaper, The Nationalist (27 October 1969) that 14 Zanzibaris had been executed in Zanzibar by a firing squad.
The Nationalist published that front page news without comment. Nor was there any comment from the President of Tanzania.
Enough has been said and documented in favour of Nyerere`s experiment with socialism - its successes and failures.
My own assessment is that all said and done it did produce a new cadre of Tanzanian entrepreneurs - in the final analysis perhaps they were more survivors than casualties.
Writing in The East African newspapers of 18 October 1999, a veteran Kenyan journalist who once worked in Tanzania, Philip Ochieng, said:
``Nyerere: an intellectual of immense stature, a man of great personal integrity, a paragon of humanism.
Julius Kambarage will be hard to replace in Tanzania, in Africa and on the globe…that is why, as I mourn, I ask, with Marcus Antonius, whence cometh such other?``
May his soul rest in eternal peace!
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