Julius Nyerere

President of Tanganyika (1962-1964) and president of Tanzania (1964-1985)

• Born: April 13, 1922
• Birthplace: Butiama, Tanganyika (now Tanzania)
• Died: October 14, 1999
• Place of death: London, England

Nyerere peacefully brought an end to the British United Nations Trusteeship of Tanzania and became the founder of independent Tanzania. Throughout the 1960’s, 1970’s, and 1980’s, he opposed racial oppression and discrimination of all types.

Early Life

Julius Kambarage Nyerere (nyeh-REH-reh) was born in the village of Butiama in Zanakiland, Tanganyika. He was named for his father, Chief Nyerere Burito, who ruled the surrounding area. Nyerere grew up in the sheltered, peaceful, safe world of the Zanaki. He learned Zanaki traditions and was initiated into manhood. His basic values were African and never changed, though he added Western values and skills to this foundation later in life. Nyerere’s father sheltered him from the humiliations and dehumanization of the colonial system until he was certain that his son had developed self-assurance that no insult or mistreatment could destroy. His father believed that this was important for a man destined to lead his people.

Nyerere took Zanaki values to school with him, such as the notion that a leader’s first duty is to serve his people; that group interests are more important than individual interests; and that social welfare depends on cooperation, not competition. He attended Mwisenge Elementary School, Tabora High School, and Makerere College. While at Makerere, he discovered political science. He stated that “John Stuart Mill’s essays on representative government and on the subjection of women . . . had a terrific influence on me.” He won an essay contest by applying Mill’s ideas to his own society. He was graduated from Makerere in 1946 and wanted to continue his education but did not have an opportunity to do so until awarded a scholarship to the University of Edinburgh in 1949.

While seeking opportunities to continue his studies, Nyerere taught school and worked as a political organizer for the Tanganyika African Association (TAA). Simple, clear explanations came naturally to him, and this earned for him the title mwalimu, meaning teacher. When he combined this skill with politics, he became the “fighting professor of Tanzania.”

Nyerere arrived in Edinburgh in 1949 and was impressed by Scottish politicians’ ability to overcome clan divisions, thereby uniting their people. He used much of what he learned from the Scots later to unify Tanganyika’s Africans. Pursuit of an arts degree at Edinburgh allowed Nyerere to formulate his own philosophy. His studies convinced him that only independence could remove the menace of colonialism.

Life’s Work

Shortly after returning to Tanganyika in 1952, Nyerere married Maria Gabriel. They moved to Zanakiland, and Nyerere made a house for his new bride using traditional building techniques. To neighbors who were shocked that a university graduate would perform such work, he replied that “everyone who has an education must work.” Nyerere assumed teaching duties at St. Mary’s and tried to ascertain the political consciousness of his fellow Africans. He learned that, in 1951, Europeans had taken large tracts of land from Meru tribespeople and evicted them. This caused bitter resentment and protest. Fear that the British would treat other tribes as callously spread. Nyerere saw in this crisis an opportunity to organize Africans and unite them.

Nyerere was elected president of the TAA in 1953, and by July 7, 1954, he had organized the TAA into a political party known as the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU). Saba saba, or the seventh day of the seventh month, is celebrated as a national holiday that rivals independence day. A few months after its formation, TANU voted to send Nyerere to the United Nations to address the United Nations Trusteeship Council on the Meru Land Case and on independence. On his return from the United Nations, Nyerere resigned his teaching position and began to work full-time for TANU. His career as a national and international politician had begun.

He argued for prohibition of land alienation, cessation of foreign immigration, expansion of education and technical training, and encouragement of trade unions and cooperatives. His logical, reasoned arguments won wide support for his position and the restoration of Meru land to the Meru people. Nyerere stated that he believed in the brotherhood of the races and that any European or Asian who accepted the principle of “one man, one vote” would be welcomed as a citizen of an independent Tanganyika.

Nyerere admired Mahatma Gandhi and wanted to achieve independence without bloodshed. Uhuru na kazi, meaning freedom and work, became TANU’s slogan and rallying cry. The party’s ranks swelled as peasants joined forces with the educated elite. Nyerere soon headed a popular grass-roots movement capable of mobilizing mass support for its policies. Without doubt dissension existed the militants wanted to abolish the office and power of the chiefs; wealthy Africans clashed with egalitarian idealists. In the early days, however, the dream of uhuru was enough to keep them together. Nyerere was convinced that a national movement had to represent all interests. TANU was fighting to build a democratic state in which each person had one vote and in this regard everyone would be equal. Since most Tanganyikans spoke Swahili, communication was not a major problem, and this helped unify Tanganyika.

When it became clear to the British that Nyerere had emerged as the spokesperson for Tanganyika’s African majority, they tried to silence him by appointing him to the legislative council on a temporary basis. He surprised everyone by using this opportunity to attack the government’s educational policy. He declared the policy inadequate, because 64 percent of school-aged African children were not in school, and no provision was made for their education. He also attacked a proposed increase in civil servant salaries, stating that salaries should be frozen and the difference applied toward the education of African youth. As rejected patrons, the British were bitter toward Nyerere, but the African masses hailed him as their champion. He became a folk hero, and the more the British attacked him the more popular he became.

By 1957, Ghana had become the first African nation to achieve independence from Great Britain. Kenya was embroiled in the Mau Mau Rebellion, and most whites in Tanganyika resigned themselves to the inevitability of majority rule. The “winds of change” were sweeping across Africa. Thus, no one was surprised that, when the colonial government called for elections in 1958, every candidate nominated by TANU won. Nyerere’s party gained control of the legislature, so Great Britain began immediate preparation to hand over power without bloodshed. By 1961, Tanganyika had achieved internal self-government and full independence. Nyerere predicted that independence did not mark the end of his nation’s problems. He began to work on his greatest challenge: eliminating poverty for the majority of Tanganyikans.

A dedicated Pan-Africanist, Nyerere convinced Karume, the leader of revolutionary Zanzibar, to combine Tanganyika and Zanzibar into a single nation now known as Tanzania. In 1963, he helped form the East African Community, which had a common currency, postal service, and airline. Irresolvable differences caused the community to collapse in 1976. Thus, the dream of transforming Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania into one large nation died too.

Nyerere emerged as a spokesperson for Africa’s oppressed. He financed refugee camps for displaced Africans and settled them on their own farms. Nyerere backed the Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) for fourteen years while Mozambicans fought to overthrow Portuguese colonial rule. He provided school and training facilities for the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa as it struggled to end apartheid and usher in power sharing in South Africa. As part of this effort, he inspired the formation of the Southern African Development Coordination Council (SADCC), an organization of the frontline African nations that border South Africa. Nyerere was one of the most outspoken opponents of apartheid and used a very high proportion of Tanzania’s income to defeat this system.

Nyerere coined the slogan uhuru na kazi. He also devised the policy of ujamaa , or African socialism, which he used to organize and mobilize the masses. Nyerere’s socialism was based on the African concept of the extended family. Land was owned collectively by the state, and individuals were to lease it as long as they could demonstrate that they were improving it or productively using it. This policy also encouraged collective production of wealth and the collective pursuit of prosperity. More than 80 percent of all Tanzanians had been moved into nucleated villages so that the government could provide them with clean water, health care, agricultural advice, and other services. Difficulties in gaining voluntary compliance caused this ujamaa vijijini, or collective village, scheme to be abandoned.

Nyerere taught Tanzanians that they could not rely on money to develop their country, because they are poor. Money, he argued, “is the weapon of the rich.” He advised Tanzanians to learn to work intelligently and to combine this with much hard work to develop their country. Education remains a key factor in this development, and it remains free up through university level for those who qualify. Under Nyerere, the number of people educated per year quadrupled the number of Africans who were educated annually by the former colonial regime.

By encouraging Tanzanians to modernize agriculture and grow enough food crops to feed themselves as well as manufacture cloth and other items used often, Nyerere taught self-reliance. Compulsory military service was used to instill discipline and made Tanzania a formidable regional power, as the country’s easy victory over Uganda in the 1977-1978 Uganda-Tanzania War proved. Nyerere taught Tanzanians to value sharing, education, hard work, and honesty and to fight all forms of discrimination. This provided Tanzanians a stable foundation on which to build their future. Perhaps the greatest lesson that Nyerere taught Tanzanians was not to covet power. In 1985, he voluntarily stepped down, making way for Ali Hassan Mwinyi to become, democratically, the second head of state of Tanzania. This proved that a coup d’état is not necessary to effect a transfer of power in Africa. It also demonstrated that a former head of state could live out the balance of his life in peace in his own nation if he managed it well. He died of leukemia in 1999.

Significance

Nyerere peacefully achieved independence for Tanzania in 1961. Using a unique form of socialism based on traditional African values and the close bonds of the family, he instilled a spirit of close cooperation, sharing, and love that he called ujamaa. Because he led by persuasion rather than force, he was affectionately known as mwalimu, or the teacher. Unlike Gandhi, he used peace wherever possible but force without fear where needed, as demonstrated by his support for African freedom fighters from Mozambique, Angola, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and South Africa for more than a decade. His calm, humor, self-control, and personal honesty and integrity, and his devotion to the education, freedom, and development of Africa and Africans gave Nyerere a place in African and world history. The development of humans remained his guiding star and the highest ideal of independent Tanzania.

Bibliography

Duggan, William Redman, and John R. Civille. Tanzania and Nyerere: A Study of Ujamaa and Nationhood. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1976. Contains substantial biographical information on Nyerere. Follows the emergence of an independent Tanzania and Nyerere’s part in that emergence. Includes an extensive bibliography, index, notes.

Graham, Shirley. Julius K. Nyerere: Teacher of Africa. New York: Julian Messner, 1975. An inspiring picture of a man born to privilege who risked everything to champion the rights of all and to build a nation where all share equally its benefits and shoulder its responsibilities.

Hatch, John. Two African Statesmen: Kaunda of Zambia and Nyerere of Tanzania. Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1976. Contains little-known facts about the British Labor Party’s role in the independence of both Zambia and Tanzania. A sympathetic portrait by a British Labor Party official who knew both leaders.

Mungazi, Dickson A. We Shall Not Fail: Values in the National Leadership of Seretse Khama, Nelson Mandala, and Julius Nyerere. Trenton, N.J.: Africa World Press, 2005. Analyzes the values and events that influenced the leadership values of Nyerere and two other African leaders.

Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Nyerere and Africa, End of an Era: Biography of Julius Kambarge Nyerere, 1922-1999, President of Tanzania. Atlanta: Protea, 2002. The first of two books by Mwakikagile, a Tanzanian political scientist, examining Nyerere’s life, political career, policies, political philosophy, and legacy.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Tanzania Under Mwalimu Nyerere: Reflections on an African Statesman. Washington, D.C.: National Academic Press, 2004. The second book by Mwakikagile continues the examination of Nyerere’s public and private lives.

Nnoli, Okwudiba. Self Reliance and Foreign Policy in Tanzania. New York: NOK, 1978. An in-depth look at Tanzania’s foreign affairs that places Nyerere in context. The president is discussed in a very favorable way. Includes an index.

Smith, William Edgett. We Must Run While They Walk: A Portrait of Africa’s Julius Nyerere. New York: Random House, 1971. A warm, endearing portrait of the man behind Tanzania’s freedom movement. The influence of his father, his brother Edward, Oscar Kambona, Rashidi Kawawa, Abeid Karume, and others on Nyerere is assessed. It is enjoyable and easy to read.