The other week, Bongolanders observed Nyerere Day — marking twenty-six years since the founding father passed away on October 14, 1999. Although I had several brief encounters with the Father of our Nation during my professional life, I vividly recall one that took place in 1978. At the time, I was a second-year student at the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM). My fellow scholars and I were at the height of our youth — hot-blooded, impatient and burning with the urge to test our immature intellectual philosophies, courtesy of the many great minds tutoring us there. Those outstanding scholars — the likes of Prof Mahmood Mamdani, Prof Issa Shivji, Prof Dan Wadada Nabudere, Prof Tandon and Dr Walter Rodney, (How Europe Underdeveloped Africa), among others — moulded our young, rusty minds to embrace new revolutionary ideas.
We were given generous doses of Marxist and Leninist theories on scientific socialism and communism under a course then known as Development Studies. The course opened our eyes to the global dialectics of our unequal, exploitative and oppressive societies. Gradually, we became angry — convinced that something urgently needed to be done to address these injustices. In parallel, activism was on the rise in Dar es Salaam, which had become a hotbed of revolutionaries from almost every corner of the world.
The city then hosted great men and women representing liberation movements fighting for freedom and equality in various parts of Africa and even Asia. From Southern Africa, we had leaders from South Africa’s ANC and PAC; from Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) came the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) with its armed wing, the Zimbabwe People’s Army (ZIPA); from South West Africa (now Namibia) came SWAPO and from Angola, the MPLA. From Mozambique, we had FRELIMO; from West Africa, officials from Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde; from North Africa, representatives of the POLISARIO Front from the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic and from Asia, officials from East Timor, to mention but a few.
Indeed, Dar es Salaam was the beating heart of liberation struggles. Naturally, under these conditions, we students at the University became actively engaged with these movements. That is why, in 1978, we vehemently opposed President Kaunda of Zambia, who was planning to engage with the apartheid regime in South Africa. We argued that he was being soft and undermining the liberation movements in the region. His country was trading with the Boer regime and aligning with the likes of Abel Muzorewa, Ndabaningi Sithole and Joshua Nkomo — Zimbabwean leaders who were ready to compromise with Ian Smith’s Rhodesian white regime. We decided to organise a protest march to State House to condemn Kaunda and urge Nyerere, then Chairman of the Frontline States, to intervene. Nyerere got wind of this planned rally and without notice, stormed the University. He lectured us for two solid hours in Nkrumah Hall on our folly and misguided outlook.
He explained the dynamics of global politics and the importance of long-term strategies in achieving one’s goals. “What are you teaching my boys and girls here?” he thundered, turning to our lecturers. “They are looking at global issues from the wrong end of the telescope! Instead of looking from the narrow end, they are looking from the wider end,” he said, lifting his kifimbo (walking stick). “And what they see are tiny little objects and issues. That is absurd!” With that, he left — leaving us in deep debate about where we had gone wrong. And that was Nyerere — the Mwalimu (Teacher) — whose legacy we continue to debate to this day.
