Nation remembers Mwalimu Nyerere
Nyerere’s last words were: “I know I shall not recover from this illness. I regret to leave my people and I know they will cry a lot…But I shall pray for them before God.”
What you need to know:
- His legacy still lingers in the minds of most ordinary Tanzanians, but within the ruling elite, it’s vanishing rapidly, thanks to the forgotten leadership values and ethics, which Mwalimu Nyerere fought hard to build in post-colonial Tanzania.
Tanzanians today remember the death of the founding father of their nation, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, who passed away in London’s Saint Thomas Hospital in the morning of October 14, 1999, after a battle with leukemia.
Fourteen years after Nyerere’s death, the impact of his leadership is still felt within and outside government circles. But various analysts doubt whether Mwalimu’s legacy is fully protected. Not only that, but there are also those who believe the values that he defended are not being fully nurtured by today’s leaders.
Nyerere’s last words were: “I know I shall not recover from this illness. I regret to leave my people and I know they will cry a lot…But I shall pray for them before God.”
His legacy still lingers in the minds of most ordinary Tanzanians, but within the ruling elite, it’s vanishing rapidly, thanks to the forgotten leadership values and ethics, which Mwalimu Nyerere fought hard to build in post-colonial Tanzania. In the eight-page special report on Nyerere, the Man and his Legacy, in The Citizen today, ordinary citizens, experts and men of God examine the legacy of Tanzania’s and indeed, Africa’s great leader whose efforts to fight imperialism and injustices went beyond this country.
