NYERERE DAY: Untold story of how Nyerere won Africa’s deadly war

Dar es Salaam. As the nation commemorates the 15th anniversary of the death of founding president Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, fresh details  have emerged on how the globally acknowledged statesman built an eight-year-long case as a curtain raiser to  the war against General Idi Amin Dada – one of Africa’s most brutal dictators.

 Some analysts had touted  a presumed western conspiracy against Tanzania, which had distinguished itself as a socialist country and one of the staunchest  supporters of the southern African liberation struggle—a stance that angered some western allies, including Britain.

There was then the Algerian dimension, whose leader  had left a will in which he stressed that, if  a war were to break out between Uganda and Tanzania, his government should stand by Mwalimu Nyerere at any cost.

There was also the case of  two managing editors who were sacked over writing an editorial  condemning Tanzania’s enemy, which angered Mwalimu Nyerere.

The Tanzanian president was playing his diplomatic cards carefully ahead of the war with Uganda.

Tanzania’s neighbours didn’t condemn Amin for claiming that part of Tanzania’s territory was Uganda’s, and it subsequently transpired that they were covertly supporting Amin in his sinister mission.

Whoever finally sits down to write the history of the Kagera war, his or her work would be incomplete without establishing why the world, including Tanzania’s neighbours, refused to condemn General Idi Amin’s invasion of the Kagera Salient on January 30,  1978, despite an impassioned appeal by President Julius Nyerere to the international community to do so.

Getting to the bottom of why the world behaved the way it did, may perhaps help to answer a number of questions which include, among others, how Tanzania presently views relations with other countries, including its own neighbours.

For one month,  Mwalimu appealed to the world to condemn the invasion – an act of blatant aggression   but there was no response, Tanzania’s neighbour  to the north, Kenya, being among those who were adamant.

“We don’t need their assistance in dealing with the invader. What we simply want is for them to condemn the invasion. That’s all we need,” Mwalimu remarked.

In fact, if there is anything that inspired Mwalimu and his tough military commanders on the need  to not only  drive out General Amin’s troops from Kagera Salient, but also to pursue the Ugandan leader inside his own country, it was the queer conduct of the international community.

Going through a well-documented book, ‘War in Uganda: The Legacy of Idi Amin’ by former BBC/Reuters Correspondent, Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey, it took hardly a week for Tanzanian troops to recapture the Kagera Salient from Ugandan troops who fled in disarray, leaving behind their heavy weapons.

It was apparent, then, that Tanzania did not need a long period of preparations for the mission. It’s apparent, furthermore, that, Tanzania’s military success taught Amin and his ragtag army of illiterate and semi literate army officers at large hard lessons never to repeat their mischief – if, and a big IF, indeed, they were in the mood to learn !

  However, it was due to the international community’s queer diplomatic conduct which finally convinced Mwalimu to prepare his country for taking out General Idi Amin from power and that explains Tanzania’s long preparation for the war.

  Mwalimu’s decision was prompted by the discovery that,  General Amin enjoyed massive support not only from the West and Israel, which  had encouraged him to topple President Milton Obote (while the latter was  attending a Commonwealth summit in Singapore), but also from his neighbours— Kenya in particular.

General Amin  also enjoyed  much support from the oil rich Saudi Arabia kingdom and Libya’s Colonel Muammar Gaddaffi who bankrolled his military hardware needs.

The Tanzanian reckoned that, given that scenario, subduing the bully General was the logical option; else, he would continue to harass Tanzanians.

Apart from Saudi Arabia and Libya other countries that supported General Amin were Britain, Israel, US, Kenya, the then Soviet Union, France, Pakistan and the then Communist East Germany.

However, of all Amin supporters, perhaps none pained Mwalimu more than the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which offered weapons and fighters.

Interestingly, even after discovering the Palestinian stance, Mwalimu didn’t complain publicly, but, on the contrary, sustained Tanzania’s support for the entity’s  struggle against Israel for nationhood.

The Palestinians had stabbed the back of the man who, unlike other wavering African leaders, had supported them to the hilt to the very end.

Mwalimu’s decision to keep quiet about the role of the Palestinians in the war appears to have been dictated by his desire to focus on General Amin rather than widen the conflict by bringing in those who supported his enemy.

Mwalimu did the same thing when he fired the first Managing Editor of the government-owned English daily, Daily News,   Ms Frene Ginwala,  a South African. She had sanctioned an editorial that described then Sudanese  President Jaafar Numeiry  as ‘a butcher’, over the latter’s execution of  young communist army officers who had tried to overthrow him in an aborted coup.

According to the paper’s Chief Photographer, Mr Adarsh Nayar who now lives in Britain, the editorial had been written by Mr Richard Gott, an avowed communist who was Ms Ginwala’s special assistant.

Mr Gott was later arrested in London and charged by the British government of spying for the then Soviet Union.

Like his stance on the Palestinians, Mwalimu fired Ginwala because he did not want to create a rift with the Sudanese leader who had just signed an agreement in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia that brought to an end the war between the Arab, Muslim north and the Christian south of the country.

Colonel Numeiry who had, with four other army officers, come to power in a 1969 military coup against the civilian government of Ismail al-Azhari, had had problems with President Milton Obote, accusing the latter of supporting the South Sudan Liberation Movement—Anyanya guerrillas.

However, when General Amin came to power in January 1970, he endeared himself to Colonel Numeiry by cutting assistance to the Anyanya guerrillas in the southern part of the country.

Mwalimu knew that the Sudanese leader was closer to General Amin, after what the latter had done to the Sudan strongman, but, being a visionary leader and strategist, he did not want the semi-official government paper to strain the relations between Sudan and Tanzania. He decided to sack Ginwala to avoid any diplomatic fallout between the two countries.

Later, as part of Mwalimu’s further attempts to bring Numeiry to his fold and isolate General Amin in the process, in 1973 he invited the Sudanese leader to Tanzania to officially open what was then known as the Saba Saba  International Trade Fair.

After the event, Numeiry and his host attended a friendly soccer match between Taifa Stars and their Ethiopian counterparts at the Uhuru Stadium, in which the latter were beaten 3-0.

All Taifa Stars goals were scored by former Cosmopolitan striker, Jumanne Masimenti who later joined Simba Sports Club.

Mid-way the historic match however, Ethiopian players  became temperamental and started attacking  Tanzanian players. Happily, the match continued without further incidents.

Mwalimu’s objective to bring Numeiry closer to him and isolate General Amin had finally paid off.

Ms Frene Ginwala refuses to leave Mwalimu!

 Twenty four years later in 1995, the love-hate relationship between Mwalimu and  Ms  Ginwala  continued unabated.

The setting was made possible when Ms Ginwala became the  first Speaker of the South African Parliament after the country’s first democratic elections in April 1994.

This was after Mzee Nelson Mandela  had been elected the first President of the black majority-led South African government.

Mwalimu came face to face with his former editor after President Mandela had officially invited him to South Africa to, among other things, visit and address the South African Parliament in Cape Town.

When Mwalimu, accompanied by Mama Maria, was ushered into the South African Parliament, it was Ms Ginwala’s turn to introduce Mwalimu to Members of the South African Parliament.

Gaddafi offers money in exchange to POW

After the end of the Kagera War,  Colonel Gaddafi tried to offer money to the Tanzanian government in exchange for hundreds of his captured soldiers that included Palestinians—prisoners of war (POWs).

Mwalimu, however, turned down the offer and handed over the now obese Libyan soldiers who had been well fed during their captivity to the Libyan  leader.

Mwalimu stated categorically that he wouldn’t  trade human beings in exchange for money or oil. During the post-war period, Tanzania faced an  acute shortage of oil, and this hampered the economy acutely; yet, Mwalimu wouldn’t stoop low to endorse such a transaction.

Western media embedded to Ugandan dictator

What compounded the situation for Mwalimu and by extension, Tanzania’s problems at the time was that even international media appeared to be siding with General Amin despite  the Uganda government’s human rights violations.

For instance, a few weeks after Ugandan troops had partly destroyed the bridge that linked the rest of the region with the Kagera Salient by using an explosions expert from Uganda’s  Kilembe Mines, Newsweek wrote the following:

‘Given the size and speed with which the Kagera River flows under the now destroyed bridge, it would be very difficult for Tanzania to repair the bridge and make it strong enough for transporting their troops and heavy armour across the bridge in readiness against Ugandan troops as they don’t have the technology to do that kind of work.’

Throughout the months as the Tanzania government made preparations for flushing out the invaders, international media went to town, throwing cold water on the country’s efforts to dislodge General Amin’s troops from the Kagera Salient.

 A helping hand from a dying leader

However, if there is anything that helped the government in knowing its true friends, then it was the very thing that had angered the Tanzania government and its people, namely, General Amin’s invasion.

A famous proverb goes: “For every  dark cloud,  there is a silver lining.” Algeria’s President, Colonel Houri Bomediene, was bed-ridden, fighting for his life against cancer.

The revolutionary Algerian leader was a bosom friend of Mwalimu who had helped Tanzania and other Frontline States in their efforts to assist liberation movements in southern Africa.

But, despite the suffering the Algerian leader was nursing on his deathbed, he had left a will to his successors to assist Tanzania in the war against General Amin to the end —and that is exactly what the Algerian government did!

Algeria’s military and other assistance to Tanzania would later lead Mwalimu to transfer to another institution, the newspaper’s Managing Editor, Mr Ferdinand Ruhinda, over an editorial whose thrust was that, Arabs were  arming General Amin.

The editorial angered Mwalimu because Arab countries that assisted General Amin were Libya and Saudi Arabia while Algeria, another Arab country had been one of Tanzania’s strongest ally in the war.

 The Algerian government continued to supply Tanzania with weapons and other assistance well after the end of the Uganda war in May 1979.

Mwalimu dispatched a seasoned diplomat and trusted confidant, Mr Benjamin Mkapa to Algiers, to  thank the Algerian government for its gestures.

British and Israeli regime in bed with Amin

In their book, Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey give their reasons why while the West, and in particular, Britain and Israel, pushed General Amin into overthrowing his Commander-in-Chief, Dr Milton Obote, who had created a lot of enemies even within his own country that included, among others, his deliberate reduction of the powers of the Baganda and other Ugandan kingdoms.

The two American journalists also show, in their book, how both Britain and Israel benefited from Uganda.

Politically, journalists say both Britain and Israel were not happy with Dr Obote’s introduction of socialist leaning policies that included what came to be known as the Common Man’s Charter.

They say Britain feared that such policies could finally lead to the expulsion  of Asians from Uganda.

Interestingly, they say, it is the very thing that the British government had feared that General Amin later implemented not long after seizing power!

The other thing that forced the West, and in particular, Britain and Israel, into pushing  General Amin to invade Tanzania, the authors say, was more or less the same thing that had made them push General Amin into overthrowing President Obote, namely, Tanzania’s socialist economic policies.

It’s important to note that by 1978, the Tanzanian economy had started to pick up and some of us were able, during this time, to see brand new motor vehicles in Dar es Salaam’s motor showrooms.

Proprietors of the showrooms would not have imported brand new vehicles if there had not been  customers.

Therefore the mere presence of such toys in the Tanzanian market reflected not only the improvement of earnings by the country’s middle class but also its steady growth as a class.

The collapse of the EAC

It is also important to note that barely a year previously, in June 1977, the East African Community had collapsed.

The implication of this meant that Kenya had problems bringing in industrial and other products mostly owned British firms such as Uniliver.

Initially those who were ill-disposed towards Tanzania and its socialist policies thought that the collapse of the Community would further impoverish Tanzania.

Therefore Tanzania’s growing economy coupled with the country’s involvement in helping armed liberation movements in southern Africa was certainly not going to be tolerated by the West.

Interestingly, Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey touch very lightly, in their book, Tanzania’s involvement in the liberation struggle of countries in southern Africa as being one of the main reasons behind the West’s decision to egg on General Amin to invade Tanzania in order to divert the country’s attention from the liberation struggle in southern Africa.

Reading their book, the authors don’t seem to have concrete evidence on their southern Africa liberation theory.

However, the answer to the question revolving around the southern Africa’s liberation  struggle as a factor is to be found in what happened, immediately Ugandan troops invaded the Kagera Salient.

Accordingly ‘War in Uganda’, after the invasion, Tanzania had itself  said that it had only one brigade (a brigade has between 4,000 and 5,000 soldiers), that was battle ready.

The other country’s four brigades located in other parts of the country were not battle prepared as they had not been involved in major training.

The brigade in question was located in southern Tanzania, in Songea, under the command of a youthful Brigadier General and former airforce pilot, James Luhanga.

The Brigade had just completed three-month gruelling training  that had included a route march from Songea to Mbeya.

According to well-informed sources in Tanzania’s military circles at the time, the preparation of Brigadier General Luhanga’s brigade was not an accident, but a deliberate move.

According to a very senior medical army doctor at the time, the brigade was apparently prepared so that it could later be sent to Namibia to join the country’s Swapo guerrillas.

The latter had already made significant headway in the struggle for a final push against the then apartheid South African troops that were propping up Namibia racist government’s troops against the guerrillas.

It should be recalled that barely three years previously , in 1975, South African troops were within 60 kilometres out of Angola’s capital, Luanda, as they fought side by side with three different rebel factions, namely, Unita guerrillas led by Dr Jonas Savimbi,  FNLA rebels led by Zairean President Mobutu Sese Seko’s brother-in-law, Mr Holden Roberto and hundreds of mercenaries in an attempt, to overthrow the newly formed Angola’s government led by Dr Augustinho Neto.

This was the time Ethiopia was under the leadership of Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam (presently living in exile in Zimbabwe) who had finally found his footing in the country after deposing two powerful army generals he had himself installed, General Andom and General Teferi Benti.

During the time, Colonel Mengistu had just led his country to a military success after the Ethiopian army’s heavy fighting against Somali troops in the Jijiga Desert in the eastern part of the country as the former fought in the quest for what was then referred to as the Greater Somalia.

Meanwhile, Cuban troops that had just helped the Ethiopian government in overcoming Somali forces in the Jijiga Desert War were still in the country.

With the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), hesitant as always, to provide military assistance to the Angolan government, Dr Neto now appealed for military assistance from the Cuban government, and the nearest Cuban soldiers in the region were still in Ethiopia.

Although Cuban troops were barely a few hours flight from Ethiopia, the problem was how to send them to Angola in time to stem off the South African troops led assault that was expected to take place any time against the Angolan city of Luanda.

At this point, Dr Neto, now turned to his friends and the country he had had both his wife and education, the Soviet Union, for assistance in providing him with planes which could airlift Cuban troops to his country.

And within 12 hours, heavy duty Tupolov transport carriers were airborne with Cuban troops on their way to Angola where they would stage the battle to save Luanda and Angola from South African troops led offensive.

The rest is of course history, for the South African led offensive that had earned its troops the name of ‘flying South African forces’ by both Time and Newsweek magazines barely a few days back, were trounced.

However, the two magazines should actually be credited for being bold enough to carry pictures of South African tanks and armoured personnel carriers running back to Namibia where they had come from.

After the sound defeat of the South African troops by the youthful Cubans, apartheid South Africa would never be the same.

After the South African troops’ defeat, Namibia was now one of the three remaining enclaves in the region, which once liberated, southern Africa will now remain with two countries yet to be liberated, namely, apartheid South Africa and Southern Rhodesia, which would in 1980 get its independence and become known as Zimbabwe under Zanu-PF led government of President Robert Mugabe.

Mozambique on the other hand, had already been liberated and was now under the Frelimo ruling party under President Samora Machel.

It is important to understand the foregoing scenarios in order to understand why  Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey write, in their book, that General Amin did not act alone when he ordered his troops to invade the Kagera Salient.

The General’s attempts to divert the attention of his enemies within the army dovetailed well with the West’s desire to divert Tanzania’s attention from supporting the armed liberation struggle in southern Africa.

Mwalimu’s role as chess master (he was also an avid lover of the Swahili bao or mancala game which has remote similarities with the way chess is played) in the framework of Southern African Liberation Chess Board was not lost on the West and the new man in apartheid South Africa who had just taken over from President John Vorster, namely, Frederick De Klerk.

The last apartheid leader who shared the Nobel Peace Prize with President Nelson Mandela, would a few years later be appointed by the ‘West’ to serve as a midwife in delivering his country to the international community through, among others, the scrapping off of apartheid, the unbanning of the African National Congress and the release of its President, Mzee Nelson Mandela.

Perhaps no one echoed the West’s conspiracy theory in the invasion of the Kagera Salient by General Amin’s troops more than a statement made by Mwalimu’s own Press Secretary and former Daily News Managing Editor, Mr Sammy Mdee.

Tony Avirgan quotes Mr Mdee on their book’s Preface as saying: “We’re not going to let the British get away with this.”

Mr Mdee was responding to Tony Avirgan’s question on the efficacy of a Radio Tanzania news item, in its early morning bulletin, that said Ugandan troops had invaded the Kagera Salient.

Tomorrow: How Nyerere rallied the nation to fight the dictator