by Ben Taylor

Prominent Tanzanian business leader, Subhash Patel, died in Dar es Salaam in December, at the age of 62.

Mr Patel was the founder and managing director of Motisun Group, which is a multimillion-dollar business, which is among the leading manufacturers in Tanzania. Among other things, the group of companies runs one of the finest hotel and resort chains in Tanzania under the Sea Cliff and White Sands brand names.

He started his entrepreneurial life as a shopkeeper in his father’s shop and later on as a trader selling spices, gradually moved into the automobile business and later into manufacturing. He went on to build a business empire ranging from manufacturing of steel sheeting and pipes, rubber, paint and fizzy drinks.

Until his passing, Subhash was the chairman of the Confederation of Tanzania Industries (CTI) and board member of the Tanzania Private Sector Foundation (TPSF), the umbrella body of the private sector. He was also a religious leader who often led prayers at his local Hindu temple in Dar es Salaam.

“I offer my sincere condolences to family members, relatives and all those who have been touched by his death. The nation has lost one of its patriots, may God rest his soul in eternal peace, Amen,” said Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa.

The former minister for Constitutional and Legal Affairs in Zanzibar, Mr Abubakar Khamis Bakar, died in November at the age of 69.

Mr Bakar placed a prominent role in union government politics in the year 2014 when he was a member of the Constituent Assembly (CA). He did not mince his words in voting against the proposed two-tier system favoured by the then President Kikwete, despite being a cabinet minister. The decision later cost him his cabinet job in the Zanzibar government under President Ali Mohamed Shein.

Born in 1951 in Pemba, Mr Bakar achieved his primary and secondary education in the Isles before joining the University of Dar es Salaam for a law degree. He later pursued a Master’s degree in law at the West Indies University. He worked in all three pillars of state: as minister in the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar (RGZ), deputy Chief Justice and Attorney General and representative in the House of Representative.
He served as a member of the Afro-Shiraz Party (ASP) and CCM, but later, he decamped to CUF and became member of the executive committee. Following the post-2015 political wrangles within CUF, Mr Bakar was among those who decamped to ACT-Wazalendo, where he served on the party’s executive committee.

The ACT-Wazalendo vice chairman for Zanzibar Juma Duni Haji said that Mr Bakar will be remembered for his role in writing constitutions of Zanzibar and that of the United Republic.

A political science lecturer at the University of Dar es Salaam, Prof Bakari Mohamed, said the deceased has left a huge legacy through the 1984 constitution that provided the Isles with principles of political and economic development of Zanzibar. “He successfully served the CCM government and the opposition CUF as head of legal issues hence greatly benefiting Zanzibar and Tanzania at large,” he said.

by Ben Taylor

The third President of Tanzania, Benjamin William Mkapa, passed away late in the evening of Thursday 23rd July, 2020, after suffering a heart attack at the age of 81.

Mkapa was born in 1938 to a poor family in Mtwara region. He earned a degree in English at Makerere College in Uganda in 1959, after which he went on to study at Columbia University in New York. He later worked as a journalist, including as Editor of The Nationalist and Uhuru (both owned by TANU) and became the founding editor of the state-owned Daily News in 1972, before being appointed the press secretary for the country’s first President, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, in 1974.

Under President Nyerere and President Ali Hassan Mwinyi, Mkapa held several cabinet posts, including Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of Information and Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education. He also served as Tanzania’s ambassador to the United States.

However, he was, to many, a surprise choice to be the ruling party’s presidential candidate in 1995. Jakaya Kikwete and Edward Lowassa were the favourites for this position, along with Salim Ahmed Salim, who was seen as Nyerere’s preferred choice. Salim declined to run for personal reasons, and Nyerere intervened against Lowassa, citing concerns about the sources of his wealth. This left Kikwete as the strong favourite, at least until a second intervention by Nyerere promoted the less well known Mkapa as a more experienced and responsible figure. In the final round Mkapa won the internal party vote over Kikwete by the narrow margin of 689 votes to 639.

Nyerere campaigned hard for Mkapa in the 1995 election – Tanzania’s first multi-party election since the early 1960s – to the extent that some newspapers treated Nyerere as if he were the nominee, side-lining Mkapa somewhat in their reporting. Mkapa won the election with 62%, well ahead of his closest rival Augustino Mrema on 28%.

As President, Mkapa was noted for continuing President Mwinyi efforts to open up the economy, and most particularly for the large-scale privatisation of state-owned industry and parastatals. He is credited/blamed (delete according to political leanings) for boosting tax collection, instituting austerity measures to curb wasteful expenditure and opening doors to foreign investors. A sleight of hand involving revised definitions allowed Mkapa to do this without either CCM or Tanzania officially abandoning Ujamaa, though it was clear that in practice economic policy under Mkapa owed little to Nyerere’s ideology.

These reforms were welcomed by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund and partly resulted in the cancellation of Tanzania’s foreign debts. Nevertheless, the privatisations in particular were much criticised within Tanzania, and Mkapa later stated that although he had good intentions the policy was not well executed.

Privatisation also led to one of two corruption scandals that tarnished Mkapa’s legacy. It has been widely reported – and denied – that he improperly appropriated to himself and his former finance Minister Daniel Yona the lucrative Kiwira coal mine in Mbeya.

The second scandal was his association with the controversial USD$40m radar system purchased by Tanzania from BAE, said to be incompatible with Tanzania’s needs at the time and which involved a $12m payment to a middleman for “marketing purposes”. This case attracted the ire of the UK International Development Secretary at the time, Clare Short.

President Mkapa also attracted international criticism for his handling of the 2000 elections in Zanzibar, where a CCM President was elected for Zanzibar despite evidence that the opposition party candidate, Seif Sharif Hamad had more votes. The polls were described by Commonwealth observers as a “shambles.” In the aftermath, the army and police shot into crowds of protestors, killing at least 35 and wounding more than 600, and those forces, accompanied by ruling party officials and militias, went on a house-to-house rampage, arresting, beating, and sexually abusing residents, according to Human Rights Watch. Approximately 2,000 temporarily fled to Kenya.

Nevertheless, Mkapa was generally a popular President, and, after stepping down following two terms in 2005, became a respected elder statesman in regional politics. Most prominently, he attempted to act as mediator between Burundi’s government and opposition groups after a disputed 2015 election plunged the country into crisis, though talks went nowhere as the government repeatedly refused to take part.

President Magufuli led tributes to the former President. “I will remember him for his great love for the nation, his piety, hard work and performance in building the economy,” he said, and declared a seven-day mourning period, with all flags flown at half-mast.

Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta sent a message of condolences and mourned the departed Tanzanian leader as an “outstanding East African who worked tirelessly for the integration, peace and progress of the region.”

Justice Augustino Ramadhani, former Chief Justice of Tanzania, died at the Aga Khan hospital in Dar es Salaam in April after a long illness.
Justice Ramadhani’s CV is long and impressive. Most prominently, he has been one of Tanzania’s foremost judges for many years, having served as Chief Justice of both Zanzibar (1978-1979 and 1980-1989) and Tanzania (2007-2010), as well as a judge of the East African Court of Justice (EACJ; 2001-2007) and a judge of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR; 2010-2016) including three years as President of the Court.

But he was also ordained as an Anglican Priest in 2013, where he had previously served as Provincial Registrar of the Anglican Church of Tanzania (2000-2007), and was appointed to lead St Albans Cathedral Church in Dar es Salaam in 2017.

He served as vice chairman of the National Electoral Commission (1993­2003), vice chairman of the Zanzibar Electoral Commission (2002-2007) and deputy chairman of the Warioba Commission on Constitutional Reform (2012).

And if that wasn’t enough, after obtaining his first degree in 1970, Ramadhani joined the Tanzania People’s Defence Force (JWTZ), reaching the rank of Brigadier General. His roles included JWTZ lawyer, head of Mugulani Camp in Dar es Salaam and head of JWTZ’s Faru Brigade in Tabora. He was involved in the war against Uganda under Idi Amin and then became Judge of the military court in Uganda.

He played piano, and in his youth was a talented basketball player. Born on Zanzibar in 1945, the grandson of Rev Cecil Majaliwa, first African priest of the Universities’ Mission to Central Africa, both his parents were teachers. Ramadhani went to primary school in Mpwapwa before attending the prestigious Tabora Boys High School. At the age of 15, he lost his father to a train crash in Manchester, UK.

He married Lieutenant Colonel Saada Mbarouk, a Muslim, in November 1975. They had four children, Francis, Bridget, Marine and Matthew.

Briefly, in 2015, Ramadhani’s name was discussed as a potential President of Tanzania, with various newspapers reporting that he was President Kiketwe’s preferred choice as a successor. As a Zanzibari Christian with broad experience and a reputation for integrity, it is easy to see the appeal. He submitted his nomination, but the party committees did not put him on the five-person shortlist.

In his various roles as a jurist, Ramadhani was seen as a passionate protector of the rule of law, and in later years, of democratic rights and freedoms. He was disappointed and privately critical of the country’s direction under President Magufuli.

Nevertheless, President Magufuli led the tributes. “I have received with great sadness the news of the death of the late Chief Justice Augustino Ramadhani,” he said in a statement. “I wish to express my sincere condolences to you, the family of the deceased, all the honourable judges and the staff of the Judiciary of Tanzania.”

Experienced diplomat and serving Minister of Constitutional and Legal Affairs, Augustine Mahiga, died on May 1, 2020 in Dodoma after a short illness, at the age of 74.

Mahiga served as Tanzania’s Minister of Foreign Affairs for four years under President Magufuli (2015–2019) before moving to his final cabinet
Obituaries 47

position. He previously served his country as an army colonel, head of the Tanzania Intelligence and Security Service (TISS), and Permanent Representative of Tanzania to the United Nations from 2003 to 2010. From 2010 to 2013 he was the UN Special Representative and Head of the United Nations Political Office for Somalia.

Mahiga was born in Tosamaganga, Iringa in 1945. He studied in Tosamaganga from Primary level up to High School, then earned a BA in Education at the University of East Africa in Dar es Salaam. He later attained a master’s degree from the University of Toronto and in 1975 a PhD in International Relations from the same institution.
“Despite his advanced age, experience and the high positions he held in government and internationally, Dr Mahiga was a humble and obedient person in the way he fulfilled his responsibilities,’’ said President Magufuli in a statement.

Opposition MP, Zitto Kabwe paid tribute, describing Mahiga as “an outstanding diplomat”.

The outgoing British High Commissioner to Tanzania, Sarah Cooke, described Mahiga as “a wise and experienced diplomat who was a close partner and friend of the UK. My thoughts and prayers are with his family at this very sad time,’’ she posted on Twitter.

Judge Mark Bomani has passed away in early September at the age of
88. He had been receiving treatment for the past month at the Muhimbili National Hospital in Dar es Salaam.

Bomani served as Tanzania’s Attorney General from 1965 to 1976, the first indigenous Tanzania to hold the position, succeeding Roland Brown. He played a big role in advising President Nyerere on the appointment of the first indigenous Chief Justice Francis Nyalali and other judges of the High Court of Tanganyika, currently the High Court of Tanzania.
After serving in the government, Judge Bomani became a senior legal advisory in the United Nations between 1976 and 1990, working towards Namibian independence from South Africa and working to devise an independent legal system for the country. He was also the chief aide to both Julius Nyerere and Nelson Mandela on peace negotiations during the first Burundian Civil War.

In 1993, he chaired the Legal Sector Task Force, which resulted in a comprehensive report on legal sector reform in Tanzania. And in 2007 he was entrusted by President Kikwete to chair a Commission on the operations of the Mining Industry in Tanzania, with a broad scope that encompassed economic benefits, governance of the sector and alleged human rights abuses.

He was also briefly a Commissioner on the National Electoral Commission
– a position he resigned in 1995 in order to seek the CCM nomination as Presidential Candidate. This controversy is still cited today as evidence that the electoral commission is not truly independent.
At various times he was Chair of the Tanzania Broadcasting Corporation (TBC), the Tanzania Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (TEITI) and the Media Council of Tanzania (MCT).

“I send my heartfelt condolences to the late Bomani’s family and all who in one way or another have been touched by the demised of the retired judge,” said President Magufuli on Twitter.

Former Industry and Trade Minister Iddi Simba passed away in February while receiving medical treatment at the Muhimbili National Hospital’s Jakaya Kikwete Cardiac Institute (JKCI).

Simba, described as “Tanzania’s staunchest proponent of indigenisation policy” and one of Tanzania’s foremost “intellectuals of capital”. He served as Minister of Commerce and then of Industry and Trade under President Mkapa, and as Chair of the Confederation of Tanzanian Industry (CTI), as well as holding senior positions with the African Development Bank and the World Bank.

Born in 1935, Simba grew up in Dar es Salaam where he received his primary and secondary education. He then attended the elite Tabora Boys School and became one of the first university graduates in post­colonial Tanganyika after obtaining a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture in 1961 from Panjab University in Pakistan.

Mr Simba is credited to have conceived the concept of indigenisation, a policy that sought to integrate Tanzanians of Africans descent into the modern economy and economically empower poor Tanzanians. In 1999, he told a gathering of members of the CTI that foreign companies which want to invest in Tanzania will be compelled to identify local partners. “If they cannot do so, the government will help them identify partners because we are now aiming at localising and promoting local participation in investments,” he said.

In June 2003, he published a twenty-page booklet titled A Concept of Indigenisation (Dhana ya Uzawa). The publication prompted the leadership of the ruling CCM, a party which Mr Simba was serving as a member of its National Executive Committee (NEC), to ban its members from using the term indigenisation (uzawa) on the grounds that it had no relation to the party’s 2000 election manifesto.

President Mkapa led the tributes to Mr Simba: “He always held to his position and he lived to be a good fighter for the advancement of the private sector,” said Mr Mkapa.

The last surviving member of the first cabinet of independent Tanganyika, Job Lusinde, died in July at the age of 89.

After early schooling in Dodoma, Lusinde studied at Tabora Boys High School and Makerere University. He returned to Dodoma as a teacher, then served as District Executive Director where he drew the attention of the future President Nyerere.

At a time of the mutiny by soldiers in January 1964, Lusinde was Minister for Home Affairs. Alongside Oscar Kambona, the powerful Defence Minister, he calmed the soldiers who were demanding fast pace of Africanisation. Lusinde was awoken by the rioting soldiers in the early hours and ordered to show where President Nyerere and his vice Rashid Kawawa were hiding. He managed to get into the State House where he found Mama Maria Nyerere and Sophia Kawawa safe. From there, it is said, he communicated directly with all the ministers, pleading with them to stay indoors for their safety. The confusion as to the whereabouts of Nyerere and Kawawa ended after Lusinde, Kambona and Bhoke Munanka traced them in Kigamboni.

For many years, he held the Communications, Transport and Works dockets. In this role, he oversaw several large infrastructure projects including negotiations and construction of the Tanzania-Zambia

Railway (TAZARA), the Tanzania-Zambia Pipeline (TANZAM) and the highway to Zambia. He stood side by side with Mwalimu Nyerere as the President inaugurated one project after another.

He lost his seat in parliament in 1975, after which he served as Tanzania’s Ambassador in China and High Commissioner in Kenya, and later as chair of the Tanzania National Parks Authority (TANAPA).

“There was no blemish on his performance,” said Former Dodoma Mayor Peter Mavunde. “He strived to discharge his roles to utmost perfection. He was my role model, I did not expect that one day I would become a politician, but under his watch, I matured steadily, ultimately becoming a mayor for Dodoma. Many politicians benefited from his wisdom.”

Former personal assistant to Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, Annar Cassam, died in Geneva in July after a long illness.

Cassam was never a well-known figure in Tanzania, despite the role she played – certainly far less well-known than Joan Wicken. And yet she played a major role in Nyerere’s presidency, particularly in foreign affairs.

She first saw and heard Nyerere as a student at the London School of Economics (LSE) in the 1960s. After specialising in international law, she went on to Geneva on a fellowship at the International Commission of Jurists until she was asked to return to Tanzania in the 1970s to work at the Foreign Affairs Ministry.

Dar es Salaam was then the headquarters of the African Liberation Committee (ALC) and Tanzania was instrumental in supporting Southern African Liberation Movements. Nyerere invested a lot of time, effort and attention on this, and with her expertise, Cassam ended up working closely with him at State House.

Her role included helping him with translations of all French correspondence, to be with the President when he was meeting French speaking leaders, and to represent the president in meetings with key local actors including revolutionary-minded scholars at the University of Dar es Salaam.

After President Nyerere’s retirement, Cassam left Tanzania to work in Geneva for the United Nations. She maintained a close interest in Tanzania and in Nyerere’s legacy, however, including co-editing a book on Nyerere’s role in Africa’s liberation struggles, published in 2010.

Her co-editor on that book, Chambi Chachage, paid tribute. “One of the lessons I learned from her is the importance of not mincing words and not refraining from challenging the ideas of others, especially when they depart from historical facts,” he wrote. “It was indeed an honour and a privilege to collaborate with someone who christened herself my ‘old shangazi’.”

by Ben Taylor

Graham Mercer was a teacher, writer and lover of Tanzania, a familiar figure to the thousands of students who passed through the International School of Tanganyika (IST), and to thousands more who read his books.

Born in St Helens in the north west of England during the Second World War, Graham attended the local Grammar School before embarking on a life-long education at “various campuses of the University of Life”, as he described it. This included time as a hotel scullery boy, post office clerk and nine years in the Royal Navy – which first took him to East Africa – before he settled into teaching. He taught first in a primary school in St Helens, for three years, before his passion for wildlife led him to Tanzania.

He began teaching at IST in 1977, where he taught for 34 years. Initially he taught elementary school classes, gradually moving towards science and information technology. This have him a front seat view as the school, the country and technology evolved. He became the school’s resident historian, publishing a book on the subject, A Very Special School, in 2010.

Indeed, writing had already become a major part of Graham’s life and work. He wrote sixteen books in all, including several tourist guidebooks on Tanzania, photobooks (some with Javed Jafferji) on various national parks, and his own memoirs. Most recently, in January of this year, he published Into the Eyes of Lions, about his experiences on safari in Tanzania over the decades. In 1988, his writing won the BBC Wildlife Magazine’s award for nature writers, and in 2016 he won the I Must Be Off! Travel Writing Competition.

Graham retired in 2012 and returned to the UK with his wife Anjum. Four years later he was diagnosed with incurable lung cancer. He refused to let this define him, however, and pressed on with his writing.

Rev Dr Gertrude Rwakatare MP was a prominent entrepreneur, a force to be reckoned with, whose interests took in education, religion and politics. She died on April 20th, 2020, at the age of 69, following a short illness.

In 1987, she founded St Mary’s school in Tabata, Dar es Salaam, meeting a demand for English-medium education among a growing middle class. This became the first of several schools in the St Mary’s chain, along with others in Morogoro, Mbeya, Dodoma and Mwanza. She later established a teachers’ college.

Rwakatare was more well-known, however as the founder (in 1995) and leader of Mikocheni B Assemblies of God church, one of the largest Pentecostal churches in Tanzania. In this role, she became a prominent figure in public life, inspiring blind devotion in her followers and scepticism and distrust from many others. She preached a severe morality, but somehow managed to become famous and (very) rich in the process.
President Kikwete appointed her as an MP in 2007, and she continued to serve as a CCM member of parliament until her death.

Human rights activist and prominent defender of the rights of people with albinism, Josephat Torner, died on April 12, 2020, at the age of 42, after being struck by a vehicle while crossing the road in Mwanza.

Torner, who himself had albinism, spent his life fighting to protect and empower those with the condition across Africa and beyond. He worked with documentary film maker Harry Freeland to make a documentary on albinism, In the Shadow of the Sun [see TA issue 125]. As part of this, Torner confronted a witchdoctor about the role of witchcraft beliefs and practices in the spate of violent attacks and murders of people with albinism in Tanzania.

Torner himself was the subject of such attacks: twice he survived attempts to take his life.

As a campaigner, he spoke out publicly against what he saw as the government’s failure to combat superstition and misconceptions surrounding albinism. He also fought to dispel such beliefs through his actions, climbing Mt Kilimanjaro twice, for example, to demonstrate that people with albinism can achieve if given the chance.

by Ben Taylor

Ali Mufuruki (15 November 1958 to 7 December 2019) was one of the few businessmen of Tanzanian African origin to make it onto the Forbes Rich List, where, in 2011, his assets were estimated at $110m. The figure may have been exaggerated, and he did not appear on the list in subsequent years, but his achievements are not in doubt.

He was born in Bukoba to parents Abdul Hassan Mufuruki and Jalliya Rutaihwa. He was employed by Daimler-Benz and studied in Germany, where in 1986 he achieved a degree-level qualification in Mechanical Design Engineering from the Fachhochschule (or Technical High School) in Reutlingen. He returned to Tanzania to be head of mechanical engineering at the state-owned National Engineering Company. Two years later he created his own company, Infotec Computers Ltd, which installed and maintained computers across Tanzania, supplying both the hardware and software. The timing was perfect: computers were suddenly a key part of the business world. The business expanded rapidly and a few years later the South African based Woolworths Holdings Ltd licensed its interests in Tanzania to the Infotec Investment Group (his holding company). Its first store in Tanzania opened in December 1999, and the franchise was subsequently extended to Uganda. Mufuruki started many other companies; the long list included a franchise of Levi’s, the US-owned maker of jeans, and, with a Norwegian company, a business selling internet-based booking systems to tourist venues. It opened office buildings, locating its headquarters in one of them, a prestigious building in Mikocheni, Dar es Salaam.

But Mufuruki was not just interested in his own businesses. He served as a director or chair of a list of companies and committees far too long to list here (but including the Tanzanian arm of Coca Cola, Vodacom Tanzania, Air Tanzania, Mwananchi Communications Ltd and the Nation Media Group in Kenya). He became involved in the international circuit of business conferences where he spoke, very effectively, about the potential, but also the weaknesses, of businesses in Africa. In 2000, he was a co-founder – and from 2005 chair – of the Chief Executive Officers Roundtable of Tanzania, providing a voice representing business interests across the whole private sector (agriculture and services as well as manufacturing), not controlled or dominated by the government.

But his long-term legacy is likely to be the book which with three friends he published in 2017. [Ali Mufuruki, Rahim Mawji, Moremi Marwa, Gilman Kasiga. Tanzania’s Industrialization Journey, 2015-2056: From an Agrarian to an Industrialised State in 40 Years. Nairobi: Moran Publishers, 2017. Also on the internet at http://online.anyflip.com/davt/tltf/mobile/index.html#p=1 See also the review in Tanzanian Affairs Issue 120, May 2018]. It broke new ground in many ways. It was probably the first book about economic strategy in Tanzania written from within the business community, rather than by academic economists or consultants from overseas. It used the authors’ experiences of their business dealings in the Asian tiger economies, and the work of the Chinese economist Justin Lin and the Korean, Ha-Jung Chang, to demonstrate the benefits of government intervention to steer the process of industrialisation. It was far ahead of its time in much of what it advocated, e.g. that energy policy be based on solar power and not on gas and oil, with as much as possible of the solar hardware fabricated in Tanzania. It presented figures to show that Tanzanian wage rates are below those in China or Bangladesh, so Tanzania can undercut them in the production of labour-intensive products such as garments or the assembly of light electronic products, and export to the whole world, provided the infrastructure is in place and efficient. Its deeper purpose was to give Tanzanians confidence that they can take control of their destinies and make their nation a better place, socially as well as economically. Tanzania has lost another of its leading businessmen, but his ideas will live on in this book, and in his many speeches and presentations on the internet. [Andrew Coulson]

Professor Harold John Cooke, FRGS (1927-2019), was one of the last of the post-war geographers who pursued successful careers in both the Colonial Service and post-Independence African academia.

Born into a working class Manchester family, John entered Manchester University on a scholarship and graduated with a Geography degree in 1948. Following a year’s National Service in the Intelligence Corps in Egypt he was posted to Tanganyika as a District Officer (cadet) in the Colonial Service in 1951. There followed a series of postings, mostly in the districts surrounding Lake Victoria, and culminating in appointment as District Commissioner in the Bukoba District in 1960.

An accomplished mountaineer, he used his free time to climb the mountains of East Africa. He made three ascents of Mt Kilimanjaro, including, in 1957, the first recorded ascent of the Heim Glacier, and the first west-east transect across the entire massif.

In 1956 he married Sylvia Kaufmann, whose family fled from Germany to Tanganyika in 1936, in Tanga. She was to be his constant companion and partner until her death in 2018.

With Tanzanian Independence in 1961 John resigned as DC and moved to the coast where he taught secondary level geography at Tanga and then Karimjee secondary schools. In 1969 he completed a PhD on the Karst of the Tanga limestone, awarded by the University College of Dar-es-Salaam.
Later that same year, John and Sylvia moved back to the UK where John took up a job as a geography teacher, before taking the opportunity two years later to establish the Department of Environmental Science at the new Botswana campus of the University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland. In 1991 they moved to rural Wales for a quiet retirement. [Philippa John-Cooke]

Sultan Qaboos bin Said (1940-2020) of Oman was the world’s longest ruling King, and a much-loved friend of Tanzania. Though an absolute monarch, who served for almost 50 years, he was both relatively benevolent and popular, including in Tanzania, where historic bonds between Zanzibar and the Omani Kingdom remain powerful.

He came to power in a bloodless coup that overthrew his father, Sultan Said bin Taimur, in 1970, and went on to turn the country from a back­ward and isolated country into a prosperous, modern state, engaged in the wider Arab region. Less impressive was the lack of political change; Qaboos retained personal control of all the main government posts and refused to delegate any real power even to other members of the royal family that has ruled Oman continuously since 1749.

The sultans of Oman ruled over much of the East African coast from 1689 to 1856, maintaining extensive trade routes. In either 1832 or 1840, the sultans moved their capital from Muscat to Zanzibar.

In December 1963, Zanzibar had a brief moment of independence when the British, who had shared power with the sultans as a protectorate (1890-1963), left the islands as a constitutional monarchy back under Omani rule. On January 12, 1964, a violent revolution in Zanzibar overthrew the sultanate, ending over two centuries of power in the region.

And yet, the ousting of the Omanis from Zanzibar in 1964 left many Zanzibaris with have strong familial and historical ties to Oman. To this day, many East Africans share a special connection with Oman, and many Omanis speak fluent Swahili.

Sultan Qaboos made quiet but a concerted effort to maintain these ties of family and friendship, particularly after Tanzania began, in the 1980s, to open her doors to tourism and trade. This included various charitable and diplomatic initiatives, the establishment of direct flights between Oman and Zanzibar in 2011, funding the construction of a new Grand Mosque of Zanzibar and the restoration of the Beit el-Ajaib (House of Wonders), and a delegation that visited Zanzibar in 2017 to strengthen cooperation along the coast.

The Sultan’s death was mourned on Zanzibar and in wider Tanzania. Even before he died, residents of Stone Town gathered at Jaws Corner to pray for his health after news circulated that he was ill.

Sultan Qaboos never married and had no children. However, he left a letter nominating his chosen successor and a meeting of the royal family agreed to support his choice: his cousin, Haitham bin Tariq Al Said, the Minister of Culture.

James Mapalala, veteran politician and one of the leading pioneers of pluralism in Tanzania, died in Dar es Salaam in October, aged 83.

Mr Mapalala is probably best known for being the first prominent Tanzanian politician to publicly demand the reinstatement of the multiparty democracy. He did so in 1986, something that angered the government at the time. Accused of forming a political party contrary to the then constitution, he was jailed for two years in Lindi and later taken to detention in the Mafia Island before being released in 1989.

He officially formed the Chama cha Wananchi (CCW) in 1991, one of the two parties (along with Kamahuru, in Zanzibar) that merged in 1993 to form the Civic United Front (CUF). He was elected to be the first CUF national chairman, the position he served until 1994, when his tenure ended following a political wrangle that erupted in the party.

To many young Tanzanians, Ambassador Paul Ndobho (1938-2019) isn’t a familiar name. But to the older generation Ndobho is revered as a strong politician, who had guts to stand even against Father of the Nation Mwalimu Julius Nyerere.

In 1968, Ndobho opposed a bill, which was orchestrated by Mwalimu Nyerere, which sought to provide gratuity allowances to MPs and ministers. His main argument was that Tanzania was still too poor to afford such kind of expenditure. Standing up to President Nyerere at that time was seen as political suicide, but Mr Ndobho’s motion sailed through with only one legislator opposing it.

Ndobho became a legislator at the young age of 27 after he won the Musoma North parliamentary seat in 1965 through Tanzania African National Unity (TANU). The constituency included the home village of Mwalimu Nyerere.

He was appointed to various positions under President Nyerere’s administration, including: Kigoma regional secretary (1975) and Tanzania ambassador to Russia (1976). After the reintroduction of multi-party politics in the early 1990s, Ndobho defected to the then main opposition NCCR-Mageuzi, winning both the endorsement of former President Nyerere and the Musoma Rural seat in parliament.

by Ben Taylor

Tanzanian billionaire, business mogul, author and philanthropist Reginald Mengi has died aged 75. From humble roots, Mr Mengi had grown a business empire spanning mining, consumer goods and the media, worth, according to Forbes Magazine, US$550 million.

The legend of Mengi’s rise is well-known, as he was not shy to tell the story regularly, including in his 2018 Memoire, I Can, I Must, I Will. He describes how he started life bedding down with the farm animals in a small hut, but made his way out of poverty via an accounting college in Glasgow. He took night classes and worked as a bus conductor and cleaner to pay his way. He got a job as an accountant with PwC and was posted first to Nairobi then back home to Tanzania, in Dar es Salaam. By 1989, when he left the firm, he had risen to the role of Chairman and Managing Partner.

In an interview with Forbes Magazine in 2014, Mengi describes how the want of a pen sparked his mind on the way to his fortune. Amid wide­spread shortages of basic supplies in the 1980s, he had spent a whole day searching the streets of Dar es Salaam for a pen when he ran into a friend who knew someone, who knew someone else, who could export pen parts to Tanzania. He assembled them on his bedroom floor. “That little business gave me my first million dollars,” said Mengi.

The extent to which such stories were exaggerated as part of the man­agement of his public profile is unclear, but it is also said that Mengi’s first marriage, into a well-connected family in his home region of Kilimanjaro, helped move his career and business along considerably.

Today, his flagship IPP Limited owns several newspapers including The Guardian and Nipashe as well as several TV and Radio stations includ­ing the country’s leading TV station, ITV. He pioneered independent media in Tanzania when state monopolies were relaxed in the 1990s. The company also has interests in a number of Coca-Cola’s bottlers and bottles its own brand of water, Kilimanjaro Drinking Water. At the time of his death, Mengi was planning to expand into vehicle assembly for Hyundai, Kia and Daewoo cars in East Africa, as well as mobile phone manufacturing.

Mengi was also one of Tanzania’s most prominent philanthropists. He gave away large sums – reportedly millions of dollars every year – to Tanzanian educational, medical and religious institutions. Through this, and with the assistance of the highly visible presence he was able to command through his own media outlets, he had become a very popular figure among Tanzanians, well known even outside business, media and political circles.

Rumours often circulated that Mengi had aspirations for a political career. His name was mentioned occasionally as an outside candidate for leadership within CCM, though this never materialised. Perhaps his occasionally outspoken remarks on environmental causes and good governance made it impossible. Or perhaps this was part of an astute business strategy: rumours of political ambitions could provide useful leverage in his dealings with government.

“I am shocked at the death of an elder and a friend Dr. Reginald Mengi,” said President Magufuli. “I will remember him for his immense contribution to the development of our country and for the words he wrote in his book. I offer my condolences to members of his family, IPP workers and the entire business community.”

Previously, the President had spoken at the launch of Mengi’s book. “One of the things that Mengi has showed us with his life is that it is possible to rise above one’s circumstances if one is willing to pay the price,” he said. “There is no shortcut to success. Mengi’s story is a wake-up call to young Africans to work hard and persevere despite of the odds,” he added.

Mengi is survived by his second wife, former beauty queen Jacqueline Ntuyabaliwe Mengi, and four children.

by Ben Taylor

Ruge Matahaba
Media and entertainment entrepreneur, Ruge Mutahaba, died in a South African hospital in February at the age of 49, following kidney failure. Officially, Ruge was Director of Strategy and Programmes Development at Clouds Media Group, but he was much more than this. He had played a leading role in transforming the popular music and entertainment industry in Tanzania over the past two decades.

Ruge co-founded Clouds Media with his long-time collaborator and business partner, Joseph Kusaga. The new radio station arrived into a music scene dominated by decades-old Tanzanian classics and stars and their music imported from the DRC or USA, and up-ended it. Ruge promoted local acts, enabling young Tanzanians to develop a musical style and culture of their own. Bongo Flava may draw heavily on American hip-hop, but it combines this with elements from taarab and dansi music as well as the creativity and imagination of street Swahili to create something uniquely and recognisably Tanzanian.

Ruge didn’t invent the style, but he enabled it to flourish. And with Ruge at the helm, Tanzanian youth culture became cool again. As social and political commentator, Elsie Eyakuze, notes, “we youth went from being nobodies to a real demographic with a voice and power. And all this because one young man decided to dedicate his entire life-force to what he loved and to do it in the country he loved. That’s why nowadays anything youth is possible.”

“We believed there was room for us to make some money in the most unconventional ways, and to promote local content because some young men had started making music,” Ruge said. Besides Clouds Media, Ruge played influential roles in establishing the Fiesta concert series, Primetime Promotions, the Smooth Vibes record label, the Sauti za Busara festival, the Fursa campaign, and Tanzania House of Talent.

Ruge Mutahaba was born in Berkeley, California in 1970. He studied primary school in Arusha and Dar es Salaam, before progressing to Forodhani Secondary for O-level and Pugu High School for A–level studies. He later joined San Jose University of California for degrees in marketing and finance.

Perhaps the best evidence of Ruge’s impact on popular culture in Tanzania is to witness the response to his death. Thousands lined the streets in mourning, first in Dar es Salaam and later in Bukoba when his body returned from South Africa.

“It is with great sadness that I received the news on the passing of my son Ruge Mutahaba,” said President John Magufuli on Twitter. “I will forever remember him for his huge contribution in the media and entertainment industry as well as his efforts in mentoring the youth. My sincere condolences to his family and friends.”

Former Tanzanian president Jakaya Kikwete said he was at a loss for words. “My heart bleeds and is filled with sadness after receiving news on the death of Ruge Mutahaba. The nation has lost a young visionary and patriot. He helped me during and even after my presidency. May he rest in peace,” Kikwete posted on Twitter.

“I do not like small dreams, I like big dreams,” Mutahaba said while delivering a lecture at University of Dodoma. “You need to be aggressive and please do not stop until you are a star.”

Hatim Amir Karimjee
It is with profound sadness that the Karimjee Jivanjee family announce the passing of Hatim Amir Karimjee on 12 January, 2019 at the age of 73, in London, England, surrounded by family and close friends. He was born in Zanzibar, Tanzania on 27 July, 1945 to the late Amir Yusufali Karimjee O.B.E and the late Kulsum Amir Karimjee.

Hatim leaves behind a deep-rooted legacy of professional and philanthropic achievements honouring his family, his community, and his country. Hatim will be deeply missed and forever cherished by his wife, Razia, his son, Yusuf, his daughter-in-law Aran, his adored grandchildren Kaleem and Danyal, and his two siblings, Zamy and Mahmood Karimjee.

He will be greatly remembered for his generosity, his sharp wit and booming spirit; his appreciation of art, and his fervent love for food, wine and travel. Hatim’s appetite for life will live on through those who knew and loved him.
Hafiz Khandwala

Peter Le Mare
Soil scientist, woodworker, yoghurt maker, occasional needleworker and environmentalist, Peter Le Mare, has died aged 95. Peter worked on the Tanganyika groundnut scheme at Kongwa in the 1940s, initially living and working in tents until houses were built.

When the scheme, intended to supply vegetable oil for the UK’s post-war diet, folded in 1952, Peter moved to Uganda, before returning to Tanzania in 1963. Peter worked on fertiliser use for tropical soils at Ukiriguru, where, in 1965, he had the honour of escorting President Julius Nyerere, for whom he had great respect, around the research plots.

Peter went to Friends’ school, Saffron Walden, in Essex, and Leighton Park school, Reading. A conscientious objector during the second world war, he was instructed to “work full-time on the land”. He went first to Rothamsted Experimental Station, Harpenden, Hertfordshire, where he assisted with field experiments to improve soil fertility and the wartime production of food.

In 1945 he began working at the ICI Research Station near Bracknell, Berkshire, where he met Joy Smallwood, a horticulturalist. They married in 1946, before moving to east Africa the following year. While there, Peter sailed on Lake Victoria in a dinghy he had built himself and climbed Kilimanjaro.

The family returned to the UK in 1969 where, back at Rothamsted, Peter wrote his PhD based on his overseas work. In 1973 he became a research fellow at Reading University specialising in tropical food crops.
Margaret Le Mare

by Ben Taylor

Mama Zippora Shekilango, an education and gender activist, died in September at the age of 80.

Her late husband, Hussein Ramadhani Shekilango, is perhaps more famous, and even has a prominent road named after him (Shekilango Road in Dar es Salaam). But it would be a mistake to see Mama Shekilango as merely her husband’s wife.

For many years, she was a doughty campaigner on gender and education issues. First, she had been a teacher and headmistress at highly successful schools including Zanaki, Msalato, Kisutu, Jangwani and Forodhani.

It was her love of education, for the girl child to have equal chances of education as the boychild, that led her to become one of the country’s leading gender rights activists. Despite coming from a generation where both men and women celebrated patriarchy, she became instrumental in advocating for gender equality. Twenty-five years ago, out of con­viction that gender equality was the way to inclusive development, with others she founded the Tanzania Gender Networking Programme (TGNP). The organisation has been at the forefront of the struggle for gender equality in Tanzania ever since.

Zitto Kabwe, the leader of the opposition party ACT Wazalendo reflected on her passing by quoting her: “Without quality education the nation will find itself stagnant and this is why it’s always important to meet and discuss the way forward.”

Saumu Jumanne, of the University of Dar es Salaam, paid tribute: “The knowledge that a teacher passes on to the students, more often than not outlives the teacher. Her values will live on. Hopefully as a nation we can learn from her dedication to teaching, gender activism and all in the spirit of patriotism. To the likes of Mama Zippora, Tanzania always came first in their doings. This is a great lesson to all of us in public services today.”

by Ben Taylor

Derek Ingram

Derek Ingram (20 June 1925 – 17 June 2018) was one of the founders of the Britain Tanzania Society. The official picture shows him with Bishop Trevor Huddleston, Roger Carter, the indefatigable first Secretary of the Society, and John Malecela and Amon Nsekala, both of whom were Tanzanian High Commissioners in London (John left the post to become Prime Minister in 1990).

Derek was a tall man – gaunt, serious, loveable, a little other-worldly, but entirely reliable and utterly frank. By 1975, when BTS was founded, he had known Julius Nyerere for at least 15 years. He described a journey to Nigeria, and on to Nkrumah’s Ghana, in 1960, which makes it clear how much he valued Nyerere’s judgements, even before Independence the following year.

Derek left school early to become a journalist – he made a good living as a sub-editor when he was only 17. After service in the navy, he worked on the Daily Express, then the Daily Mail where he was repeatedly promoted till he became Deputy Editor, before falling out with the proprietor Lord Rothermere over what he saw as his racist attitudes to Rhodesia. At this point, in 1967, he and a friend set up Gemini News Service, a network of journalists across the Commonwealth. Six stories were printed on gestetner machines, stuffed into enveloped and mailed out to its loyal subscribers twice a week. It was never a financial suc­cess but launched many careers, including Lindsay Hilsum and Trevor MacDonald, and enabled those living and working in one part of the Commonwealth to know a little about what was happening elsewhere. Derek insisted on accuracy, clarity, clear simple English, and the impor­tance of contacts built up over many years. It made him one of the most respected journalists in the Commonwealth, an expert on all its coun­tries. Derek himself lived quietly in London, never married, devoted to his life’s work.

Gemini carried on till 2002. Derek never lost his interest, and continued reading the newspapers every day and writing and talking to his huge circle of friends. He died peacefully just short of his 93rd birthday. The Britain Tanzania Society was just one of his interests, but we would be very different without him.

Andrew Coulson

Maria and Consolata Mwakikuti

Maria and Consolata Mwakikuti (1996-2018) were conjoined twins whose positive outlook and determination to survive against the odds had captured the hearts of Tanzanians. They died in June at the age 21 after suffering respiratory complications at Iringa Regional Hospital.

The women, who were joined from the navel downwards and shared organs like the liver and lungs, had two hearts and separate heads and arms, and were against the idea of being surgically separated. The twins were very well known in Tanzania and the news of their deaths caused sadness nationwide.

President John Magufuli tweeted that he was “saddened” by their deaths, adding that Consolata and Maria had “dreamed of serving the nation”.
Health Minister, Ummy Mwalimu, said the twins “have fought a war to an end. Rest in peace, Maria and Consolata.”

Maria and Consolata were born in Makete, Njombe Region, in 1996. With care and support provided by Maria Consolata, a Catholic charity that adopted and named them, they were able to complete secondary education. Last year they enrolled with the Ruaha Catholic University (RUCU) with the goal of becoming teachers.

by Ben Taylor

When American conservationist Esmond Bradley Martin (1941-2018) was brutally murdered in his home in Lang’ata, Nairobi, on 4th February 2018, the world lost one of its most dedicated and fearless wildlife investigators, known for his meticulously researched reports on illegal trading in rhino horn and elephant ivory.

The East African coast also lost one of its best researchers. He began his career by writing about Malindi and the Lamu archipelago, before moving on to study the dhow trade. Cargoes of the East, written with his wife Chryssee, is now a classic, as is the keenly observed account of his research trips in the mid-1970s, Zanzibar: Tradition and Revolution, still one of the best introductions to the islands.

After an absence of 30 years, Martin returned to Zanzibar in 2006 to attend a conference on dhows and sailing in the Indian Ocean. With characteristic energy and enthusiasm, as well as looking up old friends and making new ones, he also found time to collect material for an article on the local trade in African civet skins.
He’ll be remembered most, though, for his undercover research into the global ivory and rhino horn trades. His tragic murder was widely covered in the international press, along with ample speculation on the reasons for it (a botched robbery? A contract killing?). The case remains unsolved.
Martin Walsh

Born in Zanzibar, Ophelia Mascarenhas (1938-2017) completed her Cambridge School Certificate in 1953, was accepted at Makerere University College to read for an Honours Degree and graduated from University of London in 1962. She joined her husband Adolfo Mascarenhas at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) where she studied School Librarianship, awarded MLS (1965) and appointed as Librarian at the University of DSM in 1966. Later, Ophelia was the first woman in Tanzania to get a Fulbright Scholarship; and was selected to join a University of her choice, Clark University which had close con­nections to the University of Dar es Salaam. In 1986 she obtained a PhD in Geography.

Ophelia was a highly respected reference librarian, as well as a researcher/scholar on information and gender studies in her own right. She transformed the East Africana Collection to become the flagship for research and information in East and Central Africa and encouraged students, staff and other researchers to explore relevant information and not be stuck in their disciplinary bias.

Ophelia was promoted through ranks at the UDSM to become the first Tanzanian Professor of Library Studies. She served as Director of the UDSM Library from 1986 to 1991 where she significantly contributed to the improvement of library services in general. In 1995 in recognition of her hard work and dedication, she was declared the best UDSM worker from the University Library. She was not only an administrator but an innovator, pushing for the then new technology CD-ROM with a grant from Carnegie to help researchers and students, and also started an Environmental Data Bank with the support of DANIDA. Her services were widely sought and she served as an advisor to the Irish Embassy for their Development Work in Morogoro Region, advocating for self-reliance and participation. Ophelia was appointed by President Mwinyi to be the Chair of the Tanzania Library Services (TLS) and during her tenure TLS expanded beyond Dar es Salaam into every Region with the mandate that secondary school pupils be given full access. In 1996 she took a sabbatical and moved to Harare, as a Human Resource Director in the Centre for Southern Africa newly established by the Rockefeller Foundation.

Throughout her life, as a teacher in Zanzibar and later librarian/ researcher at UDSM, Ophelia fought all types of discrimination and infringement of the rights of workers, women, rights of people to infor­mation on resources, including land, and contributed to the advance­ment of women/gender studies. She and Marjorie Mbilinyi prepared
Women and Development in Tanzania: An Annotated Bibliography for UNECA (Addis Ababa, 1980), and a more detailed analysis of women’s resistances and struggles in 1983 with additional annotations, Women in Tanzania (Uppsala, Scandinavian Institute of African Studies). The Bibliography went through nine editions. As the value of her work gained ground beyond Tanzania there was no lack of support from international agencies (SIDA, NORAD, DANIDA, UNU, the Ford Foundation etc). Ophelia was also a resource person for numerous local institutions and an active participant in public fora organised by REPOA, Policy Forum, ESRF, Twaweza and TGNP Mtandao. Ophelia prepared Gender Profile of Tanzania: Enhancing Gender Equity for TGNP and SIDA in 2007 and the Gender Barometer for Tanzania (TGNP) in 2016.

After retirement, Ophelia became the Coordinator and researcher of a large four country study on ICTs in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania. This was followed by a related study supported by DFID through the Tanzanian Commission of Science & Technology (COSTECH), The Economic Impact of Telecommunications on Rural Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction in Tanzania which documented how ICT increased the gender and income gap between rich and poor. In her presentation at the Harvard Forum in 2009 she remarked that the use of mobiles had increased from to 25%, but warned that mobiles would siphon off money from the poor without support and training. She got the assistance of Airtel to train 100 micro small operators to keep accounts, use mobiles for ideas communication and markets. Following the launch in Dar es Salaam of ICT Pathways To Poverty Reduction, Ophelia was surrounded by girls from secondary and post-secondary schools, full of admiration, pride and hope that girls and women had an important contribution in bringing change.

Marjorie Mbilinyi in consultation with family members

Veteran free-thinking politician, Kingunge Ngombale Mwiru (1930­-2018), was both a patriarch and a rebel. Hi rebellious streak was at its most evident in his 2015 decision to join Edward Lowassa in defecting from CCM to Chadema, despite holding very different views from Lowassa (and Chadema) on economic matters. He stuck with this change after his preferred candidate lost the 2015 presidential elec­tion, even while many of the others who shifted party at the same time returned to the ruling party fold.

But Kingunge’s 2015 act of rebellion was certainly not his first. He was no stranger to controversy, and loved political and philosophical debate. In the 1970s, as serving government representative he refused to support a government motion in parliament. The government lost the motion and he was fired. He found himself in disagreement – sometimes pub­lic – with Mwl. Nyerere on numerous other occasions when his Marxist worldview meant he tried to push the party and country further to the left than Nyerere was willing to do. At a time when Nyerere was held in awe by many around him, when the accepted practice was to clap hands and nod approvingly at whatever the leader said, Kingunge would speak up and present an alternative view.

As a teenager in the mid-1950s, Kingunge joined the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) and worked in various capacities including secretary-general of the party’s youth league. In the 1960s, he went for university education to Liberia and Senegal, and spent some time at the Sorbonne in France. In the 1970s and 1980s, he was the chief ideologue of TANU and CCM, having taught at the party’s ideological institute at Kivukoni, Dar es Salaam. He became a key interpreter of the party’s ideology of Socialism and Self-Reliance, and was among the key figures on the process of joining TANU and the Afro Shiraz Party (ASP) of Zanzibar to found Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) in 1977. At vari­ous times he held ministerial posts, served as an MP and as Regional Commissioner in four different regions, and as secretary of the CCM National Executive Committee.

“His passing marks the end of an era,” said fellow political veteran, Jenerali Ulimwengu. “He is probably the last of the young people who joined the ranks of independence campaigners and stayed on to serve his party, and country. His was an age of the politics of conviction and commitment; he has checked out in the age of the politics of expediency and convenience.”

“Kigunge has contributed a lot for this nation,” said President Magufuli in a statement. “We will never forget what he did for this country. We will remember his good deeds and most specifically his fight for the interests of the nation, particularly in maintaining peace and unity,” he said.

Socialite, model and “video queen”, Agnes “Masogange” Gerald (1989-2017), was a regular on the front pages of Tanzania’s celebrity obsessed Udaku tabloid newspapers. She made her name as an actress in Tanzanian music videos, and indeed quite literally took her stage name after featuring in one such video by Belle 9, called “Masogange”.

In one sense, Masogange was a master of suggestion – hinting at affairs, pregnancies and more on her social media profiles. Editors loved it – this was exactly the kind of gossip and scandal that sold their papers. In another sense, she was far from subtle: a google search for her image shows a wide selection of photos drawing attention to one thing in particular – her curvaceous behind. This too sold papers. Her profile on Instagram, a photo-sharing social media platform read “I got ass, I’m beautiful, I know how to make money.”

She attracted headlines too for her alleged drug use. Two weeks prior to her death, she was sentenced to a fine of TSh 1.5m ($700) or a two-year jail term, having been found guilty of using heroin. She was among the first of the high-profile targets of the efforts of Dar es Salaam Regional Commissioner, Paul Makonda, to clamp down on drug problems. This was not her first drug-related case: in 2013 she had been arrested at a South African airport in possession of suspicious chemicals.
Masogange died at the young age of 28, while receiving treatment for pneumonia at hospital in Dar es Salaam.

by Ben Taylor

The editorial team is sorry to inform you that Hugh Wenban-Smith, a contributor to Tanzanian Affairs for many years, has sadly passed away. A full obituary will follow in the next issue of Tanzanian Affairs.

Dedicated conservation activist, Wayne Lotter (1965-2017), was murdered by an unknown assailant in Dar es Salaam on August 16, 2017. His taxi from the airport was stopped by another vehicle at the junction of Chole Road and Haile Selassie Road in Masaki. Two men opened his car door, one of whom then shot him. The police are reported as saying they believe he was deliberately targeted for his work. Three people have been charged with the murder. Wayne leaves behind his wife Inge, daughters Cara Jayne and Tamsin, and parents Vera and Charles Lotter.

Originally from South Africa, Wayne had become a leading and innovative conservationist in Tanzania, but his work made him well-known in global conservation circles around the world. Born in Johannesburg, he spent much of his childhood on safari in Kruger National Park. He studied for a master’s degree in nature conservation at Tshwane University in 1990, and spent many years as a ranger in South Africa before shifting his attention to Tanzania.

In recent years, Lotter’s primary focus was the Selous-Niassa corridor in Southern Tanzania, where much of the slaughter of elephants had been taking place. An estimated 60% of Tanzania’s elephant population were killed between 2009 and 2014.

Rather than simply bolster policing efforts, Lotter recognised that a more intelligent approach was needed to address such a complex problem. With two colleagues, he founded the Protected Areas Management Solutions (PAMS) Foundation, and recruited a network of informants in poaching areas who would track both elephants and suspected poachers. When the poachers were then arrested, so much was known about their movements that it became much easier to convince them to provide information on those higher up the chain.

This intelligence-led approach worked. In five years more than 2,000 poachers were arrested. More significantly, the rate of poaching was cut dramatically and the elephant population began to stabilise. And partly as a result of his efforts with PAMS and with the National and Transnational Serious Crimes Investigations Unit in Tanzania that he also helped to establish, several key figures in the poaching and ivory business were arrested: the so-called “The Queen of Ivory”, Yang Fenglan, and Boniface Malyango, also known as “Shetani Hana Huruma” / The Devil With No Mercy, who is said to have killed or ordered the killing of 10,000 elephants.

Of course, this meant that he knew his life was in danger. He received multiple death threats. “My deepest condolences to Wayne’s family and all those at PAMS Foundation for this senseless loss,” said Prince William, patron of the conservation charity, Tusk. “Governments and NGOs must win this fight for the sake of all of us, especially those in communities whose livelihoods are being plundered by murderous criminals.”

Renowned primatologist, Dame Jane Goodall, described Wayne as a hero of hers and a hero to many. “If this cowardly shooting was an attempt to bring the work of the PAMS Foundation to an end it will fail.

Those who have been inspired by Wayne will fight on,” she said. “Wayne devoted his life to Africa’s wildlife,” read a statement released by the PAMS Foundation. “From working as a ranger in his native South Africa as a young man to leading the charge against poaching in Tanzania, he cared deeply about the people and animals that populate this world. Wayne’s charm, brilliance and eccentric sense of humour gave him the unique ability to make those around him constantly laugh and smile. He died bravely fighting for the cause he was most passionate about.”

The politician and former coach of Taifa Stars, the Tanzania national football team, Joel Nkaya Bendera (1950-2017) died in December at Muhimbili National Hospital in Dar es Salaam.

By some, Bendera will be remembered most for guiding Taifa Stars to the Africa Cup of Nations in Nigeria in 1980, the only time the team has ever reached the finals of a major international tournament. He also had spells managing Simba Sports Club, Young Africans (Yanga) and Tanga’s African Sports.

What differentiated Bendera from many soccer coaches Tanzania has had, according to journalist Attililo Tagalile, was that he combined coaching skills with a solid grounding in psychology. He believed that for any team to win a game, it was important that the played were as well prepared mentally as they were skilled.

Bendera later went into politics, and was elected as the MP for Korogwe Urban, representing CCM. He held the post of Deputy Minister of Information, Culture and Sports from 2006, before holding various Regional Commissioner posts.

“Bendera was a brave and hard-working leader. He was very cooperative and always wanted to achieve tremendous success from the work he was doing. It is a big loss,” said President Magufuli.