Sunday 14 October 2012

Re: [wanabidii] Nyerere: No! We did not flounder

Mobhare,

Nyerere's one major achievement that other African leaders have not
been able to address is the elimination of tribalism. Tribalism is the
#1 disease in Africa since 'independence' but it's one thing that has
not ailed Tanzania at all. Even if the economic aspects of Ujamaa
didn't work out very well, but the foundation for social cohesion is
in place so the roots of the tree are strong.
I wish we could get a President in Kenya who would set the elimination
of tribalism as the #1 priority. Kagame started that in Rwanda and is
almost succeeding. Why can't African leaders ever sit down and realize
that tribalism is their major handicap? Mtume !!!

Courage




On 10/14/12, Mobhare Matinyi <matinyi@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Nyerere: No! We did not flounder
>
> Mobhare Matinyi, Washington DC. October 21, 2011. The Citizen, Tanzania.
>
> LAST week on Friday, Tanzanians marked the 12th anniversary of
> the passing of the Father of the Nation, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, following
> a
> brief but tough battle for his life in a London hospital. Luckily though,
> Mwalimu left us a legacy that can easily be retrieved from many of his
> words.
>
> In one of the his interviews, Mwalimu spoke to Dr Ikaweba Bunting, an
> African American who lived in Tanzania for almost three decades following
> Nyerere's invitation when he visited Harlem, New York, in the late 1960s.
> Dr
> Bunting also served in the Burundi Peace Negotiation Facilitation Team
> under Mwalimu and later under Nelson Mandela.
>
> Dr Bunting interviewed Nyerere in December 1998 in Butiama village,
> Tanzania. Thus, on January 1, 1999, the first day of the year that Mwalimu
> passed away, the London-based magazine, New
> Internationalist, published a along article titled - The Heart
> of Africa. In that article, Nyerere addressed the key issues that haunt
> Tanzania and Africa even today.
>
> This was one of the Bunting's
> questions - a question that many people would have asked Nyerere even today:
> "Does the Arusha Declaration still stand
> up today?"
>
> Nyerere replied: "I still
> travel around with it. I read it over and over to see what I would change.
> Maybe I would improve on the Swahili that was used but the Declaration is
> still
> valid: I would not change a thing. . . . We articulated a new national
> objective; we stressed that development is about all our people and not just
> a
> small and privileged minority. The Arusha Declaration was what made
> Tanzania distinctly Tanzania."
>
> Today
> Tanzania is thinking of borrowing a page from the Arusha Declaration about
> the
> leadership code. What did Mwalimu say about leaders? "We stated what we
> stood
> for, we laid down a code of conduct for our leaders and we made an effort
> to
> achieve our goals. This was obvious to all, even if we made mistakes – and
> when
> one tries anything new and uncharted there are bound to be mistakes."
>
> Mwalimu
> was proud of his achievement: "The Arusha Declaration and our democratic
> single-party system, together with our national language, Swahili, and a
> highly
> politicized and disciplined national army, transformed more than 126
> different
> tribes into a cohesive and stable nation."
>
> Nyerere
> added: "However, despite this achievement, they say we failed in Tanzania;
> that
> we floundered. But did we? We must say no. We can't deny everything we
> accomplished. The floundering of socialism has been global. This is what
> needs
> an explanation, not just the Tanzanian part of it."
>
> On the unification
> of East Africa in particular, Nyerere dropped a bombshell: "I respected
> Jomo
> immensely. It has probably never happened before in history; two heads of
> state, Milton Obote and I, went to Jomo and said to him: 'let's unite our
> countries and you be our head of state'. He said no. I think he said no
> because
> it would have put him out of his element as a Kikuyu Elder."
>
> Dr Bunting at one
> time asked: "What were your main mistakes as
> Tanzanian leader? What should you have done differently?" Nyerere started
> by saying: There are
> things that I would have done more firmly or not at all. For example, I
> would
> not nationalize the sisal plantations. This was a mistake. I did not
> realize
> how difficult it would be for the state to manage agriculture."
>
> Fortunately,
> regarding the current discussion in Tanzania on how to curb ufisadi, Nyerere
> predicted correctly:
> "But I still think that in the end Tanzania will return to the values and
> basic
> principles of the Arusha Declaration."
>
> On the topic of his
> failure and success, Nyerere gave a story of his encounter at the World Bank
> in
> Washington: "At the World Bank the first question they asked me was 'how
> did
> you fail?'I responded that we took over a country with 85 per cent of its
> adult
> population illiterate. The British ruled us for 43 years. When they left,
> there
> were two trained engineers and 12 doctors. This is the country
> we inherited. When I stepped down there was 91percent literacy and nearly
> every child was in school. We trained thousands of engineers and doctors
> and teachers."
>
> Nyerere continued:
> "In 1988 Tanzania's per-capita income was $280. Now, in 1998, it is $140. So
> I
> asked the World Bank people what went wrong. Because for the last ten years
> Tanzania has been signing on the dotted line and doing everything the IMF
> and the World Bank wanted. Enrolment in school has
> plummeted to 63 per cent and conditions in health and other social services
> have deteriorated. I asked them again: 'what went wrong?' These people just
> sat
> there looking at me."
>
> This is how Mwalimu
> finished his story: "Then they asked what could they do? I told them have
> some
> humility. Humility – they are so arrogant!"
>
> End.
>
>
>
> --
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>
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--
Karibu Jukwaa la www.mwanabidii.com
Pata nafasi mpya za Kazi www.kazibongo.blogspot.com
Blogu ya Habari na Picha www.patahabari.blogspot.com

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