Tanzania under Magufuli: A Hit or a Miss?

Much has been written about Magufuli, and there’s isn’t much of a chance that a picture may go wrong. Among his contemporaries, he was rued for his brisk. Suddenly, how did a peasant from Chato somewhere in Northern Tanzania make it to the highest table of Tanzanian politics? But then again, there’s something about Northern Tanzania and the presidency, it seems. Even in death, and like Nyerere, he is the man of the moment. Mostly for the right reasons. 

Photo: Courtesy

He died while in office, a year into his second term as president. Suluhu, who had subordinated him, took over becoming East Africa’s first woman president.

There’s so much to write about the man- his unorthodox ways of governing a country, his religious indoctrinations, his work ethic, his drive, and his nationalism. When you have as much to write, but sometimes you just can’t, is a perfect picture of Magufuli’s Tanzania.

“Tukutane Paradiso Meko! Umenihangaisha sana wewe! Bado Bashiru na Bashite sasa…,” one Kigogo posted on his timeline. 

Scribes detested his censorship of free press. His handling of the coronavirus smirked of incompetence at best, and despite irrefutable proof of the grueling global pandemic, he continued his blethers about it. The idea of wearing a mask did not augur well with him, neither did it with millions of his huge following. In defiance, he shrugged off the virus as a ‘mere cold’ that you’d fight with concoctions and prayers. This remains his biggest undoing yet. 

In the run-up to the 2020 elections, his administration rubbed shoulders with leading opposition figures. His arch-rival, Tundu Lissu, who has since sought asylum in Belgium, had a couple of bullets lodged to his frame. 

He would be airlifted to Nairobi while in critical condition for treatment. In recent times, he has elevated his criticism of Magufuli and his administration a notch higher. While speculation about the health of the head of state was rife, he was quick in his criticism terming the government as shrouded in ‘secrecy’ and ‘intimidation’. He had credible information to the effect that, Magufuli, 61, had passed away. The veracity of his claims had not been put to book as at that time.

For the days that followed, Tanzania seemed uncertain about the health of its foremost son. Some media houses in the region claimed that Magufuli had been flown to Nairobi for specialized treatment- a claim that was refuted by the country’s premier, Kassim Majaliwa, stating that the president was ‘healthy’ and ‘working hard’. Then came the pronouncement by Suluhu that Tanzania had lost its president. 

For a moment, the East African nation wavered in disbelief. At the peak of his presidential career, Magufuli’s work ethic had endeared him to millions in his native Tanzania and beyond. He had made a substantial investment in infrastructure projects like roads, railroads, bridges, and pipelines. He had gotten rid of wanton ineptitude and corruption in government offices. He had successfully renegotiated government stake with mining conglomerates. He prioritized Tanzania and its interests before anything else. When he took the oath of office, foreign trips by government officers were banned. Simply put, Magufuli in his aristocratic best, made government lean and brutally efficient. Whereas the global community decried his unorthodox techniques that scared prospective investors, his people believed in his methods and vision for the country.

A president that generated controversy and admiration, in equal measure, in life, and eternal repose. Only Magufuli would do that. 

On a Sunday that followed his untimely death, I tuned in to TBC’s Mbashara  to get a feel of Magufuli’s omnipresence in Tanzania’s geopolitics. And behold, people lined the streets in their thousands to have a glimpse of their slain president. Others, in their droves, wailed and sobbed uncontrollably as the caravan bearing the casket passed by. Women lay their wrappers on the tarmac, men laid scarfs, motorcycle riders did a convoy, others waved in disbelief, and beyond motorists made way for the revered Mtetezi wa Wanyonge. In between this emotive coverage, songs praising the former president were played. A journalist talked of his unfettered desire of making Tanzania a thriving nation. Tanzania was elevated to a middle-income status during his tenure, he commented. As the convoy headed to the airport, there was a familiar sight of the towering Nyerere Bridge.

Safe to say Tanzania had grown by leaps and bounds and had cemented its status as one of Africa’s most peaceable nations. There was a smooth transition of power, although the integrity of the 2020 elections had been cast into doubt. There was a semblance of it, but then again, you couldn’t possibly call. 

Who exactly was Dr. Magufuli, and what did encapsulate him?

Born in Chato to peasant farmers in 1959, he rose through the ranks, first as a member of parliament then serving in various ministerial positions from 1995 through 2015, to become president and Tanzania’s most illustrious son after Nyerere who went by the honorific Mwalimu. Unlike Nyerere, he was no philosopher, although both started their careers as teachers. Nyerere was for socialism and was its ardent supporter until his demise in 1999. When Magufuli took over, socialism was long dead. Ujamaa suddenly sounded like a rallying call to action – on paper. In 2015 when he took over the reins, he toiled and put in a shift, earning critical accolades in the process. His hapa kazi tu slogan catapulted him to national and international stardom. A hashtag, What would Magufuli do that took Twitter by storm, amplified his growing presidential stature. Somehow, his work ethic and tough stance on graft exposed other African heads of state and their decadence.    

Having supplanted graft and received outrageous approval ratings by his constituents, he embarked on a raft of measures that were populist at best but were seen as nationalist by his people. He renegotiated the government stake in the mining sector, prioritized Tanzania’s exports, had a border tiff with Kenya at some point, but continued putting in the shift.

Like Nyerere, he was seen as the veneer of self–reliance, effectively building the Nyerere Bridge from funds sourced internally. He was eulogized as a “Pan- African ‘by Ramaphosa for his rallying call towards the emancipation of the continent. During his 6-year stint, foreign travel by government officers was curtailed. He measly traveled himself, and when he did, it would be Uganda or Rwanda, and maybe Kenya. 

While much of his authoritarianism morphed him into prominence, his covid-19 denial is well documented. Having been a science teacher himself, his approach towards the pandemic was almost unsavory. His continued rhetoric against the vast realities of the virus posited him as a religious stoic, even as the Catholic Church to which he belonged, strongly rooted for basic covid-19 protocols to be observed.

Magufuli was the hero Tanzania wanted. Perhaps he knew. Elsewhere in neighboring Uganda, Museveni reigned morbid fear on civil society groups, cracked the whip on the opposition, and tightened the noose on the media. Kenya, which has been seen as the oasis of free speech, still grapples with the shackles of graft, extra-judicial assassinations, and unwarranted public debt. 

Dr. Magufuli’s pragmatism was probably the last of its kind. As Suluhu takes over the reins, a lot remains to be seen. Will she wrestle corruption as her predecessor did? Will she maintain the fiscal discipline Magufuli religiously observed? Will she have a firm grip on the ruling party like the bulldozer did? Will she originate reforms that will free the media from state censorship? Will she reach out to the disgruntled opposition? Only time will tell.