Recasting Julius Nyerere in Zanzibar: the Revolution, the Union and the Enemy of the Nation

Abstract

In Zanzibar, the figure of Julius Nyerere is being recast in debates over sovereignty, belonging and nationhood. Unlike mainland Tanzania, where he is upheld as the Father of the Nation, the first president of Tanganyika and Tanzania is increasingly portrayed in Zanzibar as the Enemy of the Nation responsible for the Isles' predicament. This article gives insight into the terms, actors and circulation of this pejorative narrative in relation to two central historical events: the 1964 Revolution and the Union. It also shows how such anti-Nyererism mediates anxious concerns over cultural distinctiveness and Islam.

Keywords:

• Nyerere
• Nation
• Zanzibar
• Revolution
• Union
• Islam

Acknowledgements

I presented a first version of this paper at the conference ‘Citizenship, Belonging & Political Community in Africa’ organized on 11–12 July 2012 at the British Institute in Eastern Africa (BIEA), Nairobi, Kenya by Emma Hunter from the Centre of African Studies of the University of Cambridge. Many comments and questions made on that day have been useful when revising this paper. My deep thanks also go to the two reviewers of the journal for their challenging comments. Last, I am indebted to the French Institute for Research in Africa (IFRA) for its continuous support since 2010.

Notes

1. Harding, “Nyerere in Neuem Licht.”

2. Popular perceptions of Nyerere and the Union have varied over the years. Rather positive in the 1960s, a shift occurred in the 1970s when promises of social and economic development failed to materialize. See, for instance, Glassman, War of Words, 292–93.

3. Peterson, Creative Writing.

4. Peterson, Creative Writing.

5. Ricoeur, La mémoire, 579 (my translation).

6. Peterson, Creative Writing.

7. Comaroff and Comarrof, “Ethnograpy,” 34.

8. Nora, Les lieux de mémoire.

9. Werbner, “Beyond Oblivion.”

10. Mazrui, “The Titan” of Tanzania.

11. Askew, “Sung and Unsung”; Becker, “Remembering Nyerere”; Chachage and Cassam, Africa's Liberation; Fouéré, “Julius Nyerere”; and Fouéré, “Tanzanie.”

12. The islands have a government and a House of Representatives in charge of internal affairs.

13. See Glassman, War of Words. Today's nationalisms, however, only partially meet past trends described by Glassman, which he refers to as ‘African nationalism’ and ‘civilizational nationalism’.

14. The idea of the nation as understood in Zanzibar since at least the 1950s combines a territory of defined boundaries, a sovereign polity and a common culture. This resonates with the definition of nationalism by authors such as Anderson, Imagined Communities; Gellner, Nations and Nationalism; and Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism.

15. Bissell, “Engaging Colonial Nostalgia.”

16. Quoted in Smith, Nyerere of Tanzania, 90. A simplified version is more commonly in use: ‘When the pipes play at Zanzibar, they dance at the lakes’.

17. Contrary to this view, many publications present Nyerere not only as a promoter of Swahili for the purpose of nation building but also because he was himself a lover of this language. For instance, Nyerere translated two plays of Shakespeare into Swahili, Julius Caesar and The Merchant of Venice. He also worked on the translation of the Gospels. He wrote his political writings and gave all his public political discourse in Swahili.

18. ‘Ninang'atuka lakini ninaendelea kuamini bila CCM imara nchi yetu itayumba’. The term kung'atuka made a lasting impression because it is constantly used by the CCM when asserting that it should remain the political keystone of Tanzania.

19. Glassman, War of Words, 34–9.

20. In this constitutional monarchy, inspired by the British system, the Sultan was the head of State but his powers were mostly honorific and advisorial.

21. The last census before the Revolution, in 1948, gives the racial distribution of the population, counting 264,059 inhabitants: 16.9% Arabs, 5.8% Indians, 1.1% Comorians and 75.7% Africans (24% from the mainland; 74% native). See Lofchie, Zanzibar, 71.

22. Shivji, Pan-Africanism, 62. As stated by the historian Jonathon Glassman, “the full story of the revolution has still to be written” (War of Words, 284).

23. Clayton, The Zanzibar Revolution; Martin, Zanzibar.

24. Myers, “Narrative Representations.”

25. Populations identified as ‘Shirazi’ claim their ancestors came from the city of Shiraz in Iran. They were the targets of attacks by Karume who did not regarded them as ‘African’. In the early 1970s, they were required to publicly reject their identity. See Amory, “The Politics of Identity.”

26. Mapuri, The 1964 Revolution, 1.

27. As stated earlier, the political proponents of a contested version of the great national narrative are numerous. This explains why only certain elements of this version are highlighted according to the interlocutors interviewed.

28. These visual archives are, among others, footage of the ceremony of independence on 10 December 1963, the Zanzibari delegation to the UN, photographs of the national flag, etc.

29. On the varying definitions of Swahili identity, see Caplan, “But the Coast.”

30. The possession of these linguistic and religious attributes defines the entry into civilisation (ustaarabu), and distinguishes the civilised/educated (waungwana) from the unbelieving and illiterate savages (washenzi). Former strategies of reclassification, with regard to these cultural, linguistic and religious markers, reflect the influence of this high culture on the definition of Zanzibariness. See Fair, Pastimes.

31. Glassman, War of Words. On the different narratives about the Revolution, see also and Loimeier, “Memories of Revolution.”

32. Shivji, Pan-Africanism, 46. Kassim Abdallah Hanga, an ASP uncompromising leftist intellectual, became the vice president of Zanzibar after the Revolution. Mohamed Abdulrahman Babu, leader of the Marxist Umma Party, was made Zanzibar Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Oscar Kambona was, in 1964, the Tanganyika Minister of Foreign Affairs and Defence and the confidant of Nyerere.

33. See for instance Bakari, The Democratization Process, 104, 105: ‘a group of plotters was apparently working with the support of Tanganyika’; ‘some unconfirmed sources suspected that the uprising had been well planned from the mainland’.

34. See Babakerim, The Aftermath; Fairooz, Ukweli ni huu; and Muhsin, Conflicts and Harmony in Zanzibar.

35. Ghassany, Kwaheri Ukoloni.

36. Ghassany, Kwaheri Ukoloni., xiv: “(…) kitabu hichi kimeandikwa kwa lugha ya Kiswahili ili watumiaji wa lugha hiyo waweze kufahamu namna gani historia ya Zanzibar ilivyopotoshwa na wachangiye kujenga harakati mpya (…)” (this book is written is Swahili language so that the users of this language may understand how much the history of Zanzibar was distorted, and contribute to building a new movement).

37. The few books that were put on sale in Zanzibar were sold out in a few days in July 2010. They circulated from hand to hand (personal communication).

38. If the book presents itself as academic historiography, the veracity of the collected testimonies is not only disputed within academia but also among the educated population of the Isles.

39. Ghassany, Kwaheri Ukoloni. See for instance p. 65: “Nyerere ndie alokuwa akifanya organisation (mipango) yote na kuweza kuwafanya watu wapinduwe serikali ya Zanzibar. Yeye Nyerere” (“It was Nyerere who did all the organisation and made it possible for people to overthrow the government of Zanzibar. Nyerere himself”). See also testimonies in chapters 5 and 6.

40. In a similar vein, see also the book by Nasser Abdulla Al Riyami, an Omani of Zanzibar origin, recently translated into English (2012), that cast the Revolution as an ‘invasion’, notably 147–48.

41. Dira was banned by the state in 2003, one year only after it was launched, because the newspaper was resurfacing alternative memories of the Revolution and produced counter-narratives of state history considered a threat to civil order. For more details, see Fouéré, “Reinterpreting Revolutionary Zanzibar.”

42. Zanzibar retains an independent government but cedes to the Union sovereign affairs such as the police, the defence, the interior, foreign affairs and customs.

43. Glassman, War of Words, 292–94.

44. Othman and Peter, Zanzibar and the Union Question; Rawlence, “Briefing.”

45. Glassman, War of Words, 6.

46. Muhsin, Conflicts and Harmony, 282.

47. Muhsin, Conflicts and Harmony, 162.

48. Smith, Nyerere of Tanzania.

49. In this regard, another biography in mainland Tanzania is also frequently mentioned, The Dark Side of Nyerere by Ludovick Mwijage. This text about the author's persecution and imprisonment is often cited to support the theory that Nyerere schemed and assassinated to get rid of any form of protest, whether in Zanzibar or on the mainland.

50. See Martin, Zanzibar.

51. Quoted in Myers, Verandah, 117.

52. However, Haroub Othman (“The Union,” 173) says that ‘according to Nyerere, Karume immediately agreed to the idea (of a union) and suggested that Nyerere should be the president of such a nation’.

53. Shivji, Pan-Africanism, 123–24.

54. The Arusha Declaration of 1967 established African socialism, or Ujamaa, as a development path for Tanzania based on the communitarisation of the labour force, collectivisation of the means of production, nationalisation of enterprises and establishment of free public services. Zanzibar followed a somehow different path: the left-leaning social and economic grand vision embraced by Karume was implemented in agriculture, education, housing and health but was only partially accomplished and suffered from authoritarian power.

55. For a depiction of Karume lifestyle and personality, see notably Burgess, “Karume the Terrible.”

56. Karume was assassinated at the ASP headquarters on 7 April 1972.

57. Othman “The Union,” 175.

58. See Shivji, Pan-Africanism, 123; Chachage, Environment, Aid and Politics.

59. The case of forced marriages between members of the government and young Arab girls was highly publicised internationally (Martin, Zanzibar, 69–71; Burgess, “Karume the Terrible,” 205). Amnesty International also mobilised to demand the release of political prisoners and to protest against the use of torture in prisons.

60. Chase, “The Zanzibar Treason Trial.”

61. Bakari and Makulilo, “Beyond Polarity”; “Matheson, “Maridhiano”; and Fouéré, “Chronique.”

62. Since the reintroduction of multiparty politics in 1992, all elections took place in a deleterious environment. Electoral fraud culminated in police and military violence, which, in 2001 and 2005, caused between 30 and 60 deaths and hundreds of injured. See Rawlence, “Briefing.”

63. Ecrotanal building, my translation from my recording of the meeting, 5 March 2011.

64. Baraza are stone benches built along the outside walls of houses, where people like to sit and chat. The term metonymically refers to places of daily sociability. See Loimeier, “Sit Local.”

65. Kibanda Maiti, my translation from my recording of the public sermon, 4 March 2012.

66. See their recent pamphlet, Mipango ya Kuritadisha Zanzibar, distributed during their 2012 public sermons. Fears of uncontrolled immigration and mainland secret agenda of invasion feature in Uamsho's discourse since the early 2000s, see Loimeier, “The Geography of Evil.”

67. Wilson, US Foreign Policy; Hunter, Zanzibar; and Kharusi, Zanzibar.

68. It is said that, when he was a student at Makerere University, Nyerere considered becoming a priest but he was dissuaded to do so by his friend, the White Fathers’ priest Richard Walsh. See Ludwig, Church and State, 78, 80, note 5; Civille and Duggan, Tanzania and Nyerere, 43.

69. Sivalon, Kanisa Katoliki.

70. Ludwig, “After Ujamaa,” 230.

71. Said, The Life and Times.

72. Kleist Sykes is the founder of the African Association, a political movement engaged in the struggle against colonialism. He was the Mayor of Dar es Salaam. His son, Abdulwahid Sykes, Secretary General of the Dockers Union, took over from him and founded TANU.

73. Said, The Life and Times, 111.

74. Internet also contributes strongly to this dissemination. See ‘Nyerere against Islam’ (4 June 2011) or ‘Suppressing Dissent’ (4 June 2011).

75. ‘Anayedhulimiwa asipopambana na huyo dhalimu, yeye ataendelea kuteseka wakati dhalimu atastarehe kwa amani’ (An-Nuur, January 18–20, 2011).

76. ‘Anayedhulimiwa asipopambana na huyo dhalimu, yeye ataendelea kuteseka wakati dhalimu atastarehe kwa amani’ (An-Nuur, January 18–20, 2011).

77. An-Nuur, October 21–27, 2011. On the canonization process, see notably Mesaki and Malipula, “Julius Nyerere's Influence.”

78. Glassman, War of Words.

79. In this regard, the designation of the territorial entities that make up the Union posits the speakers on the political spectrum: officially, these two entities are referred to as ‘Mainland Tanzania’ (Tanzania bara) and ‘Island Tanzania’ (Tanzania visiwani), but in Zanzibar, the mainland is often called ‘Tanganyika’. The use of colonial names symbolically erases the establishment of the Union.