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Dr Julius Kambarage Nyerere was the first President of the Republic of Tanzania after years of British colonial rule. He believed the country would advance and develop if the people were taught to be self-reliant and given opportunities for lifelong education. Adult education was the key to advancement, as people had to learn to be citizens of a free nation, working for the common good in an equal society. Unlike many other politicians in similar situations, Nyerere did not build huge personal wealth by exploiting his position. He is known as Baba wa Taifa, or ‘Father of the Nation’.
The son of the Chief of the Zanaki tribe, Julius Nyerere was born on 13 April 1922 in Butiama, on the eastern shore of lake Victoria in what was then Tanganyika. Tanganyika was a country in east Africa, where Africa's great lakes are located. Today the country of Tanzania occupies much of what was Tanganyika, and the word is now used mainly as the name of one of the great lakes, Lake Tanganyika.
Julius Nyerere was 12 when he started school, walking about 40 kms to do so. His intelligence was quickly recognised by his teachers. He went on to train as a teacher at Makerere University in Kampala, in the nearby country of Uganda. After he graduated, he taught for three years before getting a scholarship to the University of Edinburgh in Scotland , where he completed a Master of Arts degree in history and political economy. He was the first Tanzanian to study at a British university and the second to gain a university degree outside Africa. It was while he was in Edinburgh that Nyerere saw the similarity between the traditional African way of living in sharing communities and the theory of socialism, which is a system in which there is no private property, and production is owned and controlled by the government.
When he returned home to Tanganyika, Nyerere worked towards joining together different political groups who all wanted their country to be an independent nation. In 1954 these groups joined to form the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) , with Nyerere as its president, a position he held until 1977.
In 1958 he became a Member of the Legislative Assembly, in the first elections in which Africans were allowed to vote.
In 1960 he became Chief Minister of the first self-government administration, the last step before the country gained independence from Britain.
In 1961 he became Prime Minister of the first government of Independent Tanganyika.
In 1962 Tanganyika became a Republic, and he was elected President.
Independence was achieved without war or bloodshed, largely because of Nyerere’s political ability and integrity, and his willingness to work with different groups. The last British Governor, Sir Richard Turnbull, was supportive of his efforts, and this also helped the peaceful achievement of independence.
In 1964, there was an attempt to overthrow the governments of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, and Nyerere and the new leaders in Zanzibar agreed to join together into one nation, the Republic of Tanzania.
As the first President of Tanzania, Nyerere had to establish the new country, which was one of the world’s poorest . He united the 120 or so ethnic groups by adopting one national language, Kiswahili. Financial assistance from other countries decreased, and together with falling prices for the commodities the country produced, there were huge debts. His solution was to blend socialist ideas with the traditional African communal life in which traditional values and responsibilities centred around extended families, and to expand that to Tanzania as a whole. This was set out in his ‘Arusha Declaration’. He wanted to build a society in which all members have equal rights and equal opportunities, and live without injustice or exploitation. He wanted to increase the basic level of welfare for everyone rather than having rich people getting richer and living in luxury. Rural development was the key in Tanzania, and people worked co-operatively in organised villages called ujamaa, which means ‘familyhood’ in Kiswahili. Unlike forms of socialism in other countries, he did not set up officials to organise the ujamaas, and instead, the people of each ujamaa decided themselves what they produced and how they lived.
At first there was resistance to this plan, and in some places productivity went down. However, the focus on human development and self reliance resulted in better health and education.
In 1985 Julius Nyerere retired as President, succeeded by Ali Hassan Mwinyi.
Nyerere died in London on 14 October 1999, of leukaemia. He was buried in his birthplace Butiama, in Tanzania.
In October 2009, Nyerere was named World Hero of Social Justice by the United Nations General Assembly.
If you use any part of this in your own work, acknowledge this source in your bibliography like this:
Sydenham, S. & Thomas, R. Julius Nyerere [Online] www.kidcyber.com.au [2010]
Updated March 2010 ©kidcyber