On Friday, 3rd May, 2019; The Mbeya University of
Science and Technology (MUST), was
exceedingly delighted, and indeed was hugely lucky, to have been given the opportunity to play
host to a rare visit by the Head of
State, President John Pombe Magufuli, of the United Republic of Tanzania. Under normal circumstances, an official,
scheduled visit by the Head of State to any one University is, of necessity, a
very rare event; for one good reason, which
is that currently, Tanzania has no less than fifty- two duly accredited
Universities. Hence, considering the usual pressure that is ordinarily exerted on
the President’s valuable time, the organizers of the President’s official ‘high
profile’ Regional tours normally do not include Universities, when drawing up
the itinerary for such Presidential visits.
During
the First Phase Government of Mwalimu
Nyerere, the position was totally different; simply because at that
time, the country had only one University, namely the University of Dar es
Salaam; and, by a provision of the
University of Dar es Salaam Act of 1970, the President was also its Chancellor.
It will be remembered that the University of
Dar es Salaam grew out of the erstwhile “Dar es Salaam University College”,
that was a constituent College of the University of East Africa. Under the law which established he College, President
Nyerere had been appointed “Visitor” to
the College. This was a somewhat unusual position, but one which he used to the
full, by visiting the college not only on formal graduation occasions, but also
on more private and intimate visits, which gave him the opportunity to discuss
pertinent issues directly with the staff and students, mostly about politics
and the state of the national economy. In
one of these Visitor / student encounters in October 1966; a serious incident
occurred, which is worth recounting here, for it provides a valuable lesson
even for today’s students. It concerned the introduction of the “National
Service” programme, which was strongly opposed by some of the students at the
College, who therefore demanded to see the President in his capacity as Visitor
to the College, to express their objection to that programme.
When their intention was made known to President Nyerere, he
not only agreed to see them at once, but decided to invite them to State House
for the proposed talks. He obviously had made up his mind that these students
had adopted the undesirable “elitist attitudes of superiority”, which had to be
corrected; and had therefore decided to give them a bashing; not as Visitor to
the College, but as the Head of State and Government of the United
Republic.
Thus, at the end of his lecture
to them, the President ordered all the 393 students who were present at that
meeting to be sent home immediately, for a period of two years; presumably in
order to ‘pup some sense into their thick heads”. In one of his earlier speeches before this
incident, Mwalimu Nyerere had said the following :- “Our University students
have large amounts of money spent on their education, while many others have
none. Therefore, all those who receive
that privilege have a duty and an obligation, to repay the sacrifice which
others have made . . . If any of our young men and women who are given such
expensive education at the expense of the people of the United Republic begin
to adopt attitudes of superiority, they are betraying the nation”.
After the University of Dar es Salaam was established in
1970, the President, in his capacity as Chancellor of the University, had a
binding obligation to make regular, scheduled visits to the University,
primarily in order to preside over the annual graduation ceremonies. However, when the number of public
Universities started increasing rapidly in the early 1990s, the President
ceased to be Chancellor of any of them, and the said provision was removed from
the University of Dar es Salaam Ac, and
replaced by a different provision which empowers the President to appoint the Vice Chancellor. This
provision was subsequently made also in the omnibus “Tanzania Universities Act”
which governs all Tanzanian Universities. That is why President John Magufuli
is not Chancellor of any of the fifty- two current Universities; and, in
respect of the Mbeya University of Science and Technology (MUST), which is the subject of this article, I am
the lucky person appointed by President Magufuli to be its current Chancellor.
President Magufuli’s
“on the spot guidance” at the Mbeya University.
There is an old practice that is attributed to the
celebrated former leader of North Korea, Kim il Sung, which is described as “on
the spot guidance”. It simply describes
the said leader of North Korea regular habit of making a visit to a work place,
or site, of given project; and after inspecting the work that was in progress
there, would instantly issue such instructions as he would deem necessary, in order
to facilitate the successful and timely completion of the relevant project.
It
now appears that President Magufuli has fully adopted this ‘revolutionary’
practice; and therein lies the source of the substantial benefits which accrued
to Mbeya University as a result of his visit, after he issued “on the spot guidance” for certain projects
to be undertaken, “in honour of Mwalimu Nyerere”. In the course of his speech to the assembled Mbeya
University community, he ordered the
upgrading to tarmac level of the access
road which leads to the University, plus
the provision of money for the purchase
of modern teaching equipment, to replace the outdated equipment left behind by the Russians;
President said clearly that he was doing so “in honour and remembrance of the
late Mwalimu Julius Nyerere”.
As
we have already indicated above, the present Mbeya University of Science and
Technology was one of the mega projects which were initiated by Mwalimu Nyerere;
but could not be completed as planned, due to certain adverse circumstances
which suddenly emerged, and provided a total blockage to the progress of this
project; as elaborated here below. This
is how it happened:- President
Nyerere’s had secured financial support
from the Government of the ‘Union of Soviet Socialist Republics’ (USSR) (as
that country was known then), for the establishment of what would subsequently
become a Technical University, but took some time to decide on its location. When he had made his decision, he summoned the
Minister for Education, at that time Nicholas Kuhanga, to inform him that the
facility would be located in Mbeya Town.
I was fortunate to witness this event, just because it occurred at a
time when I had been appointed Executive secretary of the newly established
Chama cha Mapinduzi (CCM), and had gone to CCM Chairman Mwalimu Nyerere’s Msasani residence, to report to him on some party matter. I was
still there when Minister Kuhanga arrived.
Kudos
to the Government of the Soviet Union, which started in earnest to implement
the project, and had gone some considerable way in the construction of the
required infrastructure, when the unexpected suddenly happened, which was the
collapse of what was the Soviet Union, in 1989. That sudden occurrence effectively
closed down the major source of funding for the said project; and the
facility’s infrastructure remained practically ‘stunted’ at the level it had
reached when the Russians departed.
President
Magufuli’s remembrance of Mwalimu Julius
Nyerere.
In view of President Magufuli’s reference to Mwalimu Nyerere
in his speech at MUST; it may be
helpful at this juncture, to remind our readers of the current
generation, of some of the late President Nyerere’s works and thoughts with regard to the purpose of education in general, and of University
education in particular. Because of
limited editorial space, it is not possible to give full treatment to this
important aspect in this article. However, we can make some brief references to
Mwalimu Nyerere’s important policy of “Education for Self-Reliance”.
“Education for Self- Reliance” (ESR).
In March 1967, Mwalimu Nyerere published a ‘treatise’ titled
Education for Self-Reliance” (Government
Printer, Dar es Salaam). This was a by-product
of the wider policy document titled “TANU’s policy on Socialism and
Self-Reliance”, also authored by Mwalimu Nyerere himself, which had been
published a month earlier in February, 1967. Basically, the ESR document was a
critical analysis of the educational system that had been inherited from the
colonial Administration, and it also identified the ill effects that system had
created, including ‘elitism, social
inequality, and the indignity of manual work’.
In
that document, Mwalimu Nyerere stated as
follows: “ The education provided by the Colonial Administration was not
designed to prepare our young people for the service of their own country;
instead, it was motivated by a desire to inculcate the values of the colonizing
society . . . It induced attitudes of human inequality; and in practice,
underpinned the domination of the weak by the strong, especially in the
economic field . . . Our education must therefore inculcate a sense of
commitment to the total community, and help the students to accept the values
appropriate to our society’s needs and requirements”. But in addition, Mwalimu Nyerere also considered technical education as one
sure way of achieving the objective of self-reliance. That is precisely why, when the University of
Dar es Salaam was established in July 1970, (having been upgraded from the
previous Dar es Salaam University College of the University of East Africa), it had no Faculty of Engineering, because the
policy of the University of East Africa had
been to distribute the major professional disciplines of Medicine, Engineering
and Law; to each of the three University Colleges. Accordingly, the Faculty of
Engineering had been given to Nairobi University College. But soon after Dar es Salaam University
College had attained University status, President Nyerere quickly initiated
discussions with the German Government, for support in the construction and
establishment of a Faculty of Engineering; plus a Technical College in
Arusha. Agreement
on both these projects was soon reached, and, in my capacity as Vice Chancellor
of the University of Dar es Salaam at the material time, I was mandated to lead
a small three-person delegation to Bonn, Germany, to put the final touches, and to sign
the said Agreement.
But, in President Nyerere’s far-sighted
view, that would not be enough for the country’s future needs for the provision
of engineering skills. Thus, partly inspired by the example of the Kwame
Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Ghana, he requested support
from the Government of the Soviet Union for the establishment, initially, of Mbeya Technical College; which would be
progressively developed to the status of an accredited University. This Technical College was subsequently
upgraded to “Mbeya Institute of Science
and Technology (MIST) as a
transitional stage in preparation for its conversion to its present status of
Mbeya University of Science and Technology (MUST).
This was eventually achieved in
2012; in fulfilment of Mwalimu Nyerere’s
‘dream’. This
is the story of the genesis of Mbeya University of Science and Technology
which, only last week, was privileged to host a ‘rare’ visit by the Head of
State, President John Pombe Magufuli.
piomsekwa@gmail.com /0754767576.
Source: Daily News and courtesy of Cde Msekwa.
