Julius Rex: Nyerere through the eyes of his critics, 1953–2013

Abstract

This article examines political critics of Tanzania's first president, Julius K. Nyerere. While his detractors varied greatly in both ideological and sociological terms, the three major groups studied here shared a sharp intellectual frustration with Nyerere's effective utilization of humility as a political weapon to control debate, court international support, and silence opposition. Foreign critics, primarily European writers, were divided principally by their social proximity to Nyerere – older white “decolonizers” lamented their friend's embrace of authoritarian tactics to achieve utopian ends, while younger writers instead saw a distant and unworldly figure best understood in abstract philosophical terms. The most vocal Tanzanian critics, by contrast, were united by the heavy-handed actions they and their families had endured at the hands of the Tanzanian state, which in turn produced sharply personalized criticisms.

Keywords:

• Tanzania
• decolonization
• socialism
• political opposition
• authoritarianism
• journalism
• imprisonment

Acknowledgement

The author wishes to thank Marie-Aude Fouéré, Tom Molony, and the journal's anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

Notes

1. African National Congress statement on the death of Julius Nyerere, 14 October 1999, ANC Department of Information and Publicity, at Nyerere Foundation website www.juliusnyerere.info, accessed on 19 February 2013.

2. Letter of Richard Gott, Guardian, 18 October 1999.

3. Obituary of Julius Nyerere, Times, 15 October 1999.

4. David Frum, “Nyerere's Failed Vision Leaves lasting Debt,” National Post (Ontario), 16 October 1999.

5. “Nyerere, the Leader Who Achieved by Cunning What Idi Amin Achieved by Force” by Anthony Daniels, Daily Mail, 15 October 1999.

6. For starting points on internal dissenting groups, see, respectively, Hirji (ed.), Cheche; Hunter, “The History and Affairs of TANU”; Giblin, A History of the Excluded; and Feierman, Peasant Intellectuals.

7. United States National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), College Park MD, Record Group (RG) 59 778.13/10-2561, Duggan to Department of State, 25 October 1961.

8. Duggan and Civille, Tanzania and Nyerere, 42.

9. NARA RG 59 778.00/4-2156, notes of conversation held on 19 January 1956 between Miss Margaret Bates and Sir Edward Twining, enclosed in McKinnon to Department of State, 21 April 1956.

10. United Kingdom National Archives (UKNA), Colonial Office (CO) 822/859/f.33, Twining to Lennox-Boyd, 31 October 1955.

11. UKNA CO 822/859, minute of Macpherson to Hare, 17 September 1956.

12. UKNA Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) 141/17912, Tanganyika Special Branch study of Julius Kambarage Nyerere, August 1957, 6.

13. UKNA CO 822/859, minute of Mathieson to Gorell Barnes, 7 September 1956.

14. UKNA CO 822/859, minute of Gorell Barnes to Macpherson, 12 September 1956.

15. UKNA CO 822/912/f.30, Mathieson to Twining, 28 December 1956.

16. UKNA CO 822/1362/f.162, Twining to Lennox-Boyd, 21 December 1957.

17. UKNA CO 822/1449, minute of Webber to Gorell Barnes, 10 June 1959.

18. Rhodes House, University of Oxford (RH) MSS Afr.s.2179, Colonial Records Project interview with Iain Macleod, 29 December 1967.

19. RH MSS Afr.s.2089, Timothy Mayhew, “Reminisces” (1965–68), 139.

20. UKNA CO 822/1450/f.246, Turnbull to Crawford, 9 July 1959.

21. Iliffe, A Modern History, 511.

22. Listowel Papers (LP) Box 1 File 8, Listowel to Sister Maria Renata, 22 November 1962. I thank Lord Richard Grantley for providing my access to the privately held papers of his grandmother.

23. Judith Listowel, “Tanganyika's Chances,” The Tablet, 15 December 1962.

24. NARA RG 59 778.00/10-2262, memorandum of conversation, Julius K. Nyerere and William Leonhart, 5 October 1962, Kilombero, Rusha Valley, enclosed in Leonhart to Department of State, 22 October 1962.

25. RH MSS Afr.s.1604, memorandum entitled “Tanganyika: Church and Political Situation 1961” by Sydney Clague-Smith to Lionel Greaves.

26. Smith, Nyerere of Tanzania, 30.

27. UKNA Dominions Office (DO) 213/209/f.4, Dominions Office note on Julius Nyerere, n. a., July 1963.

28. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Boston MA (JFKL) Presidential Office File (POF) 124-013, biographic entry of Julius Nyerere, July 1961, CIA Office of Central Reference.

29. JFKL POF 124-13, biographic entry of Nyerere, n.a., dated 10 July 1963.

30. “Personal Tragedy of Julius Nyerere” by Anthony Sampson, Observer, 26 January 1964.

31. Listowel, The Making of Tanganyika.

32. “The Delicate Balance,” The Tablet, 6 February 1965, 148.

33. LP Box 1 File 9, Listowel to Turnbull, 7 April 1967.

34. See, inter alia, “Nyerere's Integration Problem,” Daily Telegraph, 28 August 1967.

35. LP Box 1 File 9, “Socialism in Tanzania” by Judith Listowel, BBC script for transmission on 17 May 1967.

36. “President Nyerere's Fight for Unity” by Judith Listowel, Times (London), 9 April 1965.

37. LP Box 1 File 9, Listowel to Bullock, 17 April 1967.

38. On British journalism and political engagement in 1960s Tanzania, see especially Hunter, “British Tanzaphilia.”

39. Judith Listowel, “Tanzania and her future: problems of building African socialism,” The Round Table, July 1970, 284.

40. For an early appreciation, see Mazrui, “Tanzaphilia”; for villagization, see Jennings, Surrogates of the State.

41. UKNA FCO 31/1764, draft of FCO briefing for the Prime Minister's meeting with President Nyerere of Tanzania, 15 September 1974.

42. Kissinger, Years of Renewal, 932, 936.

43. “Freedom's Rocky Road” by David Reed, Reader's Digest, February 1973.

44. McNeil, “The rivers of Zimbabwe.”

45. Greig, The Communist Challenge to Africa, 132–33.

46. Daniels, Zanzibar to Timbuktu, 27.

47. Msigwa, Filosofa's Republic

48. Msigwa, Filosofa's Republic, 44.

49. Msigwa, Filosofa's Republic, 4.

50. Msigwa, Filosofa's Republic, 121.

51. Msigwa, Filosofa's Republic, 122.

52. “How Smugglers Ended Nyerere's Dream” by Xan Smiley, Guardian, 10 August 1980.

53. Naipaul, North of South, 197–8.

54. Naipaul, North of South, 198.

55. Naipaul, North of South, 199.

56. Naipaul, North of South, 271.

57. Naipaul, North of South, 273.

58. Naipaul, North of South, 284.

59. Iliffe, A Modern History, 507–76; Said, The Life and Times, 110–47, 233–60.

60. For examples of this indirect style in Dar es Salaam, see Brennan, “Blood Enemies”; for factionalism among political elites, see Hartmann, “The Arusha Declaration revisited.”

61. Lowenkopf, “Political Parties,” 140.

62. Letter from John Nellis to John Richard Crutcher, 16 November 1966, quoted in Crutcher, “Political Authority in Ghana and Tanzania,” 287, footnote 30.

63. NARA RG 59 778.00/4-1861, Duggan to Department of State, 18 April 1961.

64. Brennan, “The Short History of Political Opposition.”

65. LP Box 1 File 9, Listowel to Turnbull, 13 April 1967.

66. They were connected to the paper in a subsequent treason trial that followed their arrest in 1969 for plotting a coup attempt.

67. Ukweli, 28 July 1968, copy in Lady Chesham Papers, Box 4, Borthwick Institute, University of York.

68. “How Smugglers Ended Nyerere's Dream” by Xan Smiley, Guardian, 10 August 1980.

69. “A Challenge to Nyerere,” Free Zanzibar Voice, July/August 1971.

70. Sections were later incorporated into Muhsin's self-published memoir Conflicts and Harmony in Zanzibar (Dubai, 2000).

71. Muhsin, I Was Nyerere's Prisoner, 11.

72. Muhsin, I Was Nyerere's Prisoner, 16.

73. Muhsin, I Was Nyerere's Prisoner, 26.

74. “Does Nyerere Practise What He Preaches?” Free Zanzibar Voice, September/October 1971.

75. “The Duty that lies West of Zanzibar,” Free Zanzibar Voice, March 1973.

76. “Nyerere vs. Jumbe: a legal tug-of-war,” Free Zanzibar Voice, April 1973.

77. “The Freedom of Zanzibar: A Questionnaire for Nyerere,” Free Zanzibar Voice, April 1973.

78. “Prisoners Should Be Freed,” Free Zanzibar Voice, July/August 1973.

79. As recounted in Mwijage's updated version of the same book, retitled Julius K Nyerere: Servant of God or Untarnished Tyrant?, 11. The original was published as Mwijage, The Dark side of Nyerere's legacy, and later widely distributed as a text document on a variety of websites.

80. Communication with Mohamed Said, 31 March 2011.

81. Mwijage, Of Magic and Mutiny.

82. Said, Life and Times of Abdulwahid Sykes, 282–315.

83. Ghassany, Kwaheri Ukoloni, Kwaheri Uhuru!

84. Letter of Oscar Kambona, Guardian, 7 April 1971.

85. Co-ordination Committee for Freedom and Democracy in Tanzania pamphlet entitled ‘Anglo-Tanzania Committee’, n. d. [circa 1974], in Ahmed Seif Kharusi papers, privately held.

86. Oscar Kambona, “The Time I Met Mao,” Salisbury Review, June 1991, 19.

87. There is no adequate biography; for helpful overviews, see Othman, Babu.

88. “How I became a State Guest”, n. a., Habusu 6 (1976), Northwestern University Library.

89. Amnesty International's annual reports on Tanzania over the 1970s increasingly stress the thousand-plus cases of detention without trial. In general see Moyn, The Last Utopia.

90. Nyerere, Our Leadership.

91. “Nyerere's reported doubts about the one-party system in Africa,” 11 June 1986, BBC Monitoring Summary of World Broadcasts.

92. “Nyerere denounces party's ‘incompetence’,” 20 January 1987, BBC Monitoring Summary of World Broadcasts.

93. “African Statesman Still Sowing Seeds for Future” by James McKinley, New York Times, 1 September 1996.

94. See, e.g., Chachage and Cassam (eds.), Africa's Liberation; and McDonald and Sahle (eds.), The Legacies of Julius Nyerere.

95. Fouéré, “Tanzanie: l'imaginaire national.”

96. Becker, “Remembering Nyerere,” 261.

97. “Slaa amtumia Nyerere kummaliza Kikwete,” Raia Mwema, 6 October 2010; “Can Opposition Demonstrations Oust the Government?,” The Citizen (Dar es Salaam), 1 March 2011.