BY CHIEF WILFRED MIRAMBO
Some journeys are more than simply travelling from one place to another. They become journeys of memory, family, history and reflection. My recent journey to Birmingham for my grandchild’s graduation was one such occasion.
I travelled to Birmingham filled with excitement and anticipation. Watching my grandchild graduate was a deeply proud moment for the whole family and for me. Graduation is not only a celebration of academic achievement; it is also a reminder of the hard work, determination and sacrifices that make such an achievement possible.
As I watched my grandchild receive her degree, I felt an enormous sense of pride. I thought about the journey that had brought them to that important day and about the opportunities that education can create for the next generation. It was a moment that made me reflect on how far our families can travel when we value learning and encourage our children and grandchildren.
Yet, interesting as Birmingham was, the most emotional part of my journey came further north, in Edinburgh, Scotland.
There, I had the privilege of visiting the University of Edinburgh, the institution where our founding President, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, studied from 1949 to 1952.
Simply reaching the university and knowing that I was standing at an institution where Mwalimu had studied more than seven decades earlier was deeply moving.
Here had come a young man from colonial Tanganyika in search of knowledge. At that time, nobody could have known that this young student would eventually return home, help lead his country to independence and become the founding President of the United Republic of Tanzania.
“Being at the university where Mwalimu studied gave me a powerful sense of connection with our own national history. I found myself thinking about the young Nyerere who had once walked through this institution as a student, long before he became the leader we all came to know.”
The significance of Nyerere’s journey to Britain becomes even greater when one considers how unusual such an opportunity was at the time.
Nyerere became the first Tanzanian to study at a British university and was only the second Tanzanian to obtain a university degree outside Africa. He belonged to a pioneering generation of East Africans who travelled abroad for higher education at a time when such opportunities were extremely rare.
I tried to imagine his arrival in Scotland in 1949—a young African coming from Tanganyika into an environment vastly different from the one he had known at home.
“What must have gone through his mind as he walked these streets? What dreams did he carry? Did he already know that history was preparing him for something much greater?”
There is another fascinating aspect of Nyerere’s Edinburgh story that particularly impressed me.
He had initially been expected to study biology in England. But Nyerere knew that his intellectual interests lay elsewhere. He argued for the opportunity to pursue the arts and humanities instead and eventually came to Edinburgh.
That decision may appear simple today but in the context of the time it was significant. African students were often encouraged towards subjects considered more “practical”, while the humanities, philosophy and political thought were not always regarded as natural choices for them.
Nyerere refused to allow others to determine the direction of his mind.
“That story touched me deeply. Here was a young African being pointed in one direction, yet he had the confidence to say, in effect: ‘This is where my mind belongs.’ Perhaps even then we could see the independence of thought that would later define Mwalimu.”
At Edinburgh, he studied subjects including English, History, Law, Political Economy, Philosophy and Social Anthropology.
These were not merely academic subjects. They exposed him to ideas about society, government, justice, economics and the relationship between people and the state.
During his years in Edinburgh, Nyerere also became increasingly engaged in political discussion and anti-colonial thought. He participated in political meetings and contributed to the intellectual debates taking place around him.
As I stood within the university surroundings, I found myself thinking about the extraordinary contrast between the young student who arrived in Scotland and the national leader he would later become.
“He arrived here as a student from colonial Tanganyika. He returned home as a teacher. And within a few years that teacher would help awaken a nation.”
That thought stayed with me.
My journey also included a visit to the Tanzania High Commission in London, where I had the honour of signing the visitors’ book.
There was something particularly moving about entering Tanzania’s diplomatic home while thousands of kilometres away from Arusha.
“However far one travels, there is a special feeling that comes when you see your country’s flag flying abroad. For a moment, you feel that you have arrived home while still being far away from home.”
After three weeks, it was time to return to Tanzania.
I came back grateful to my children for inviting me and giving me the opportunity to return to Britain after some 40 years.
The experience was very different from my first visit. Four decades provide enough time for cities, societies and even travellers themselves to change. Returning to London therefore felt not simply like another journey but an opportunity to look again at a place I had known long ago through older and more reflective eyes.
London impressed me with its vibrancy, infrastructure and ability to preserve history while embracing modernity. Edinburgh impressed me with its beauty and intellectual heritage.
But visiting the University of Edinburgh, where Mwalimu Nyerere once studied, left the deepest impression.
“Buildings may survive for centuries and monuments may preserve names, but perhaps the greatest monument any human being can leave behind is the difference he makes in the lives of his people.”
That, for me, was the lasting lesson of my return to the United Kingdom, some 40 years after my first visit.
