Tanzania picks former Deputy Health Minister to vie for position of WHO Africa boss

Dar es Salaam. Tanzania is advancing Dr Faustine Ndugulile for the role of World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Director for Africa, The Citizen has learnt.

Dr Ndugulile’s name will be officially announced as Tanzania’s selected candidate for the position today at an event attended by senior officials from the ministries of Health and Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation.

Dr Ndugulile was unable to join the discussion yesterday.

However, officials from the Ministries of Health, Foreign Affairs, and East African Cooperation have told The Citizen that Dr Ndugulle, who formerly served as Deputy Minister for Health, will be the guy to beat other candidates from other countries for the position. “Tanzania has picked Dr Ndugulile for the position of WHO Regional Director for Africa and an official announcement will be made tomorrow,” said the source.

Should Tanzania’s bid for the position sail through, Dr Ndugulile who is currently the Member of Parliament (MP) for Kigamboni, will replace Dr Matshidiso Moeti, a Tswana whose tenure expires in August after serving in the position since 2015.

Analysts say obtaining the opportunity to secure the position was a significant step for the medical profession and also a great achievement for the country.

“Dr Ndugulile is one of our fellow doctors, and we had him at our meeting last year in Tanga. When we see one of our fellow doctors getting such an opportunity, it is an honour for us to be recognised, and it also reflects well on our country, showing that Tanzania has capable individuals who can even lead other nations. We wish him all the best,” said the President of the Medical Association of Tanzania (MAT), Dr Deus Ndilanha.

Dr Ndugulile holds a Doctorate of Medicine and Master of Science in Microbiology degrees from the University of Dar es Salaam and a Master of Public Health degree from the University of Western Cape.

With a specialty in Public Health and Medical Microbiology, Dr Ndugulile joined politics in 2010, and he has been a legislator for Kigamboni since then. He has previously served as past Vice-Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Social Services and Community Development and Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on HIV/AIDS and Substance Abuse.

Dr Ndugulile has been a Member of the Pan African Parliament (2015–2017), a member of the American Society of Microbiologists (ASM), the Tanzania Public Health Association (TPHA), and the Secretary-General and later Chairman of the Tanzania Parliamentarians AIDS Coalition (TAPAC).

He served as Deputy Minister for Health, Community Development, Gender and the Elderly between 2017 and 2020.

That was precisely the time when he showed himself to be a person who stands by what he learnt in the classroom and what he has practiced as a medical professional.

It was during his time as the deputy minister for Health, when Tanzania was going through troubled waters, that experts tried to strike a balance between their academic positions and their political affiliations while simultaneously working to remain in the good books of the then President John Magufuli. With the president’s position of denying the presence of Covid-19 in Tanzania, Dr Ndugulile did just what other experts feared to do.

With the President publicly expressing his reservations over the correctness of laboratory Covid-19 tests and instead encouraging Tanzanians to opt for traditional methods of fighting the pandemic, including steam inhalation, Dr Ndugulile openly proclaimed the opposite.

It April 2020, Dr Ndugulile warned against some traditional means of treating patients, including making patients inhale vapour from some boiled herbs.

He said such a tendency may block the respiratory system. “Several people have spoken about some traditional remedies for Covid-19….Putting the patient close to the vapour of some heated or boiled herbs is not the right option because it may obstruct the respiratory system, which cannot tolerate too much heat,” he told a local television station.

One month later, he was dropped from the position of deputy Health minister.