Tanganyika's Journey to Independence

The historical background reveals a number of factors which enabled a non-ethnic form of political nationalism to emerge in Tanganyika in the late colonial period. The first factor was the dispersal of Tanganyika's population- The country has been spared the deeply divisive potentialities of ethnic cleavages partly because it did not have concentrated populations in competition with one another; nor were wealth and power concentrated in the hands of one group. It is significant that although the man who emerged as leader - Julius Nyerere - came from a small community of the country, there was no strong resentment of his leadership in a society of this kind.

A second factor is the unifying role of Kiswahili as a common language for the whole country, which thus helped to cement unity among ethnic groups and provinces.

Kiswahili was spread widely in pre-colonial times as a result of the extensive trading net- work established from the eastern Congo basin to the East African coast by interior African and coastal Swahili-Arab traders. German colonial rule provided a further powerful boost to linguistic unity when the Germans made Kiswahili the language of Western-type government and mission education. But at the same time as Kiswahili was developed as the language of the Western-educated elite it was not an elite language, and served as a means to unite all sectors of the African population. A third factor is the example of non-ethnic resistance to colonial rule provided by the Map Maji Rebellion of 1905-7. The significance of the rebellion for later generations of Tanganyikans was not its tragic failure and the brutal suppression that followed it. But rather the way in which numerous ethnic communities of the south-eastern part of the country found common cause and achieved a unity that overrode their earlier divisions and mutual suspicions.

The Maji-Maji Rebellion influenced later Tanganyikan nationalism in other ways apart from inspiration. The failure of violent resistance against colonial rule led to a realization that peaceful forms of political activity might achieve more for the people. After the First World War a number of locally based voluntary welfare associations and unions emerged, aiming to raise living standards by self-improvement and self-help. Examples were the Bukoba-Bahaya Union (1924) and the Kilimanjaro Native Planters Association (1925).

But the most important of the inter-war associations was the urban-based and non-ethnic Tanganyika African Association (TAA), which had set up nine branches by 1939- In the 1930s the TAA campaigned for the welfare, advancement and rights of Africans. After the Second World War, the TAA became a more openly nationalist movement, and became transformed into TANU which led Tanganyika to independence.

The African farmers objected less to agricultural progress than to the lack of consultation with them over the new measures. (In contrast, in the Gold Coast in the early 1950s the CPP government achieved considerable success in persuading farmers to cut out diseased cocoa trees by consulting with them and educating them.)

Alienation of land for European settlement also provided a great stimulus to African political consciousness. The famous Meru Land Case arose our of the eviction of 3000 Meru from their land in 1947 to make way for European settlers. The Meru leader Kirilo Japhet brought the case to world attention when, after founding the Meru Citizens' Union of Freemen in 1951, he visited the UN headquarters in New York to present a petition in 1952. Kirilo also toured Tanganyika to present his cause to his own country- men. Thus he helped to rouse fear of land alienation among other communities and stimulated the nationalist movement and support for the TAA.

The TAA wound up at the formation of TANU in 1954. However, the TAA had paved the way for the emergence of a radical mass nationalist party. The TAA had provided Tanganyika with a non-ethnic and countrywide movement; with a mass movement composed not only of an elite and sub-elite of civil servants, traders and clerks but also of peasants and workers; and with a political tradition of non-violence - not passive but active non-violence which had moved from the early Stage of presenting petitions to direct action.

The Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) was created on 7 July 1954, for the purpose of achieving a single objective: independence under an African government. TANU took over from the TAA but transformed the headquarters links with the provinces by providing a more radical and dynamic central leadership in Dar-es-Salaam. The President of TANU was Julius Nyerere, a school teacher who had been born in 1921 among a small ethnic group in the north, and had returned to Tanganyika in 1952 after taking an arts degree at Edinburgh University in Scotland.

In 1956 Nyerere resigned as a teacher in order to work full-time as a politician. TANU benefited from Nyerere's leadership in a number of ways. First, Nyerere applied to Tanganyika some of the tactics of positive action that Nkrumah and the CPP had put in practice in the Gold Coast. In some ways TANU was modelled along CPP lines. Secondly, Nyerere made adroit use of the country's position as a UN Trust Territory.

The 1954 UN Mission to Tanganyika paid careful attention to TANU's proposals and its report recommended a timetable for planned progress towards independence. In 1955 Nyerere made the first of many visits to New York to seek further support for his programme of early independence. Thirdly, there were the personal qualities of Nyerere himself. 'Mwalimu' (Teacher) combined intellectual genius with qualities like warmth and humility, a combination which captivated the public and helped to win widespread support for TANU.

Nyerere's emphasis on positive action along CPP lines led to more direct expressions of the people's grievances. As a result TANU was banned on several occasions in different localities. By 1958 TANU had been banned in eleven districts. At the same time TANU's policy of non-violence made it easier for Britain to make the political concessions that Tanganyika needed.

At first, however, Britain's decolonization policy faltered and was misdirected along a blocked channel. In 1957 the administration launched a policy of multiracialism. Multi- racial district councils were introduced in the provinces. This was not political progress because hitherto exclusively African councils now had European and Asian members, a measure that met general African opposition. In Geita in 1958 there were riots because of the fear that a multiracial council would be set up in the district and then land would be given to Europeans and Asians. Multiracialism gave a boost to TANU's membership and pushed it over the 200 000 mark.

In January 1958 the TANU Conference had to decide whether or not to take part in the 1958-9 election under the multiracial party system. Opinion was almost overwhelmingly in favour of a boycott of the election, for TANU was a non-racial party open to Africans and non-Africans alike. However, Nyerere, a master tactician, advised taking part in the election, and the conference accepted his advice. Nyerere knew TANU could win the election and then could work more effectively to change the constitution. In other words, TANU should fight for independence both from inside and outside government.

If TANU boycotted the election, the white-settler-dominated United Tanganyika Party (UTP) would win and would delay independence. Moreover, multiracialism was 'justified' by the dominant role of non-Africans in the economy and on the principle that political power should be in proportion to economic power. A UTP victory would also delay the transfer of control over the economy to Africans.

Welcoming Turnbull

TANU won the 1958-9 election easily and thus Nyerere's tactics were vindicated. Voters had to elect three members for each constituency, an African, an Asian and a European. TANU won all the African and some European and Asian seats. In June 1959 TANU was given five ministerial posts out of twelve. TANU could now change the system of government from within. Fortunately for the country's immediate future Britain had appointed Sir Richard Turnbull as the new Governor in 1958, with instructions to help prepare the country for early independence.

Nyerere in a happy mood with Governor Turnbull

Turnbull had been Chief Secretary in the Kenya Government at the height of the Mau- Mau Rebellion, and he was determined to avoid another revolt by implementing speedy African political progress in Tanganyika. A natural liberal and a shy and erudite man, Turnbull was able to establish a close friendship with Nyerere. A new constitution provided for elections in August I960 for 50 open seats, 11 Asian seats and to European seats. TANU won 70 out of the 71 seats, the one other going to a rebel TANU candidate opposed to the official candidate. Nyerere now became Chief Minister of a TANU government. In March 1961 a constitutional conference was held in Dar-es- Salaam; Tanganyika achieved internal self-government on I May and full independence on 9 December.

Thus Tanganyika emerged into political freedom with a single party which united all the African language groups. No African opposition party emerged because there were no ethnic divisions to foster such an opposition.