Last Saturday, 17th February, 2024, Hon. Edward Lowassa, our fallen political guru son of the soil was laid to rest in his grave in his Monduli home District, after five days of official national mourning, with the national flags flying at half-mast, in honour of the fallen former Prime Minister, which culminated with a befitting ‘state funeral’ ceremony at Karimjee Hall grounds, presided over by the Vice President, Dr. Phillip Mpango on behalf of President Samia Suluhu Hassan, who is temporarily away from the country on a historic visit to Norway.
A statement attributed to Hubert Lister Parker, Lord Chief Justice of England(!900–1972), which appeared in ‘The Observer’ British newspaper on 12th March, 1961; reads as follows:-“A judge is not supposed to know anything about the facts of life, until they have been presented in evidence, and explained to him at least three times”.
Many good things have already been said by many different people, about our fallen political guru the late Edward Lowassa, ‘in evidence’ of his outstanding contributions to the political management of our young nation’s affairs during his 35 years of dedicated service to this nation. “The country has lost an iconic leader, who offered himself for the nation”, said President Samia Suluhu Hassan; in her condolence message to his widow, Regina Lowassa. Many other leaders, both current and retired, have proffered their personal views and opinions, reflecting on Lowassa’s leadership legacy, through which he would always be remembered.
But I still felt I should also add my own little voice in order, if I may borrow the language of Lord Chief Justice Hubert Parker quoted above, to add up to the minimum “three times” (the number of explanations needed), to enable the public to “know more of the facts” about Edward Lowassa’s life in the service of our nation. As the Holy Bible says in the Old Testament, “Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with all thy might, for there is no work, no wisdom, in the grave whither thou goest”.
Edward Lowassa has now gone to his grave, but during his lifetime, he did, indeed, comply fully with this Bible teaching, by doing all that he was assigned to do diligently, and “with all his might”; as evidenced by the numerous statements made about him by people from all walks of life, and generously published in the mass or social media.
My exposure to Edward Lowassa’s political life. My brief exposure to the late Edward Lowassa’s life, commenced in the early 1970s, when I was the Vice Chancellor of the University of Dar es Salaam, and he was a student thereof. That is when his political leadership potential became evident, and noticeable; because of the very active role he played in the activities of the University TANU Youth League Branch and became one of its leaders.
Thereafter, we met again at the end of the year 1990, after the general election of October that year; in which I had participated, and been elected Member of Parliament for Ukerewe and Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly; and he had also participated and been elected Member of Parliament for Monduli, plus being appointed Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office, responsible for Parliamentary affairs.
The Prime Minister is designated by the constitution, as ‘Leader of Government Business in the National Assembly’. It was during that period That is when he demonstrated his leadership skills, or prowess; when he excelled in assisting Prime Minister John Samuel Malecela, in carrying out these responsibilities.
It is also during that period, when he and I developed very close working relations, and actually became personal friends. This is because the Speaker of the National Assembly at that time was Chief Adam Sapi Mkwawa, whose health was fast deteriorating, mainly due to old age. For that reason, I was often called upon to take over the Speaker’s Chair, to preside over the House proceedings.
Hon. Lowassa was completely new to Parliament, while I had the rich parliamentary experience of having previously been the Clerk of the National Assembly immediately after the country’s independence. Hence, he developed the habit of consulting me on many procedural issues. In that particular respect, what quickly comes to mind, is his call one day to me, to ask for guidance on the delicate and sensitive issue of the ‘three-government’ structure of our Union with Zanzibar. This story is told in greater detail in my book titled “A concise political history of Tanzania”; which was published to celebrate 50 years of Tanganyika’s independence, by Nyambari Nyangwine Publishers, Da es Salaam. But I will summarize it very briefly in the paragraphs below.
On 24th August, 1993, the National Assembly passed a resolution, directing the government “to undertake a process, which will enable it to introduce in the National Assembly, not later than April 1995, proposals for a more acceptable structure, which will include a government of Tanganyika in the Union structure”.
If implemented, this resolution would transform the Union into a‘three-government’ structure. It was, in essence, a rebellion, against the ruling party’s established policy of a “two-government structure. Thus, CCM reacted strongly in defense of its cherished policy.
But eventually, through a series of meetings, plus the intervention of the retired President Mwalimu Julius Nyerere; the matter was resolved by way of a referendum, which involved voting on the issue by the entire CCM membership at the party Branch level. The results of this voting showed clear preference for the maintenance of ‘two-government’ structure. Thereafter, President Ali Hassan Mwinyi, in his capacity as the national party Chairman, went to a meeting of the CCM caucus, to announce these results; and the party caucus accepted defeat.
But the difficulty then arose, as what to do with the National Assembly Resolution. Bunge Resolutions are actually directives to the government, which must be implemented. That is what caused Minister Edward Lowassa’s call to me, to seek advice. My advice was that a new National Assembly resolution was necessary, which would rescind the previous resolution.
Thus, he made arrangements for a “Private Members’ Motion” to be introduced in the National Assembly for that purpose, The said motion was passed in August 1994.
Lowassa’s subsequent great political misfortunes
There is a saying that “misfortunes never come singly”. This, indeed, also happened to be the case, Edward Lowassa. I vividly remember two particular misfortunes, which utterly frustrated him, in the course of his political career. One was his forced resignation from the Premiership, in February 2008; and the other was his three successive failed attempts to win the Presidency. The details of the first misfortune, are as follows: -Edward Lowassa was appointed Prime Minister by President Jakaya Kikwete, immediately following the 2005 general election. But he was unable even to complete the normal five-year term in that office, simply because of a serious alleged “corruption scandal”, which was raised against him; relating to a government contract for the procurement of an electricity generating plant.
At that material time, the country was experiencing a prolonged drought, which led to the drying up of the major rivers which are used for hydro power electricity supply. Thus, threatening to put the country into darkness.
The only viable solution was to engage a company or group of companies, which would supply sufficient fuel-generated electricity for the country’s needs. Hence, the procurement procedures were duly undertaken, and, eventually, three companies were shortlisted, among them a fake Canadian company known as ‘Richmond’, which was duly awarded the lucrative contract, but the said company’ failed to deliver the goods in the agreed time frame; and rumours started circulating, alleging that such company did not, in fact, exist!
This became known as the “Richmond scandal”; which turned out to be a huge political scandal of crisis proportions. It raised very serious allegations of corruption on the part of the government, and led to the matter being discussed in Parliament, which decided to appoint a parliamentary Select committee to investigate the matter. The committee’s Report was presented to Parliament at its February session in 2008.
The National Assembly hot debate on this report, resulted in the emergence of two antagonistic groups, the “Mafiadi” group on one side: and the “Anti-mafisadi” group on the other. The matter had reached crisis proportions, and that is what led to the forced resignation of Prime Minister Edward Lowassa, plus two other Ministers, Nazir Karamagi, and Ibrahim Msabaha.
Lowassa’s second misfortune.
His second, and even greater misfortune, was his failure to achieve the ultimate political ambition of his life, namely, the Presidency of the United Republic of Tanzania. He made three such attempt, in 1995, in 2005, and in 2015; but all of them ended in failure, and consequent frustration. The first two attempts did not appear to affect him to such great extent, unlike the 2015 attempt; probably because of the huge personal energy, plus financial resources, which he had invested in the 2015 presidential election project.
He had been confidently preparing for his success in that election; as a result of a “Gentleman’s Agreement” between him and President Kikwete, who had, reportedly, promised to support Lowassa to be his successor at the end of his term in 2015. Thus, when election time came, he made heavy financial investments in preparation thereof. For example, the CCM process normally starts with the candidate ‘declaring’ his intention to contest the election, by simply collecting his nomination forms.
But Edward Lowassa decided to make it a major public event, held at Arusha’s Sheikh Amri Abedi football stadium, and invited as many of his supporters as would be able to make it. He sent hired planes to Dodoma and Zanzibar to fetch them; plus arranging transport by road from other areas; which filled that spacious stadium “to the brim”.
The CCM nomination process is what gave him the mega frustration, which led to his migrating to the coalition of Opposition political parties, called UKAWA. This process takes place at three different party levels, namely
(i) the Central Committee, which carefully examines all the applicants and recommends five names.
(ii) the National Executive Committee, which votes on the five candidates to select three names; and
(iii) the National Party Congress, which votes on the three names to choose one person, who becomes the CCM official candidate at the relevant Presidential election.
Lowassa’s name was not recommended by the Central Committee. His ardent supporters then decided to challenge that decision at the National Executive committee meeting, which they surely did, but still, luck was not on his side. After a lengthy discussion, the majority decided to support the Central Committee decision, a factor which eliminated him from that competition as a CCM candidate. This was the ‘mega frustration’, which is what pushed him into temporarily abandoning CCM, to go and try his luck in the Opposition camp; where he got the satisfaction of being nominated as the UKAWA candidate for the 2015 Presidential election.
However, presumably in accordance with the saying that “misfortunes do not come singly”, Edward Lowassa lost that election, which he had confidently predicted that he was going to win “before the second mass”. It must have hurt his feelings a very great deal.
piomsekwa@gmail.com /0754767576.
Source: Comrade Pius C. Msekwa.
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