The new Catholic University – the St Augustine University of Tanzania (SAUT) – was inaugurated on August 25. The university arises from the various institutions originally established at Nyegezi near Mwanza and will offer a bachelor’s degree course in mass communication, and will also offer diploma and certificate courses in journalism, accountancy, business management and hospital administration.
Photographer Muhidin Michuzi related in the Daily News of October 3 (when he was assigned to cover a three-day visit by Princess Anne to Tanzania to visit donor-supported projects) how he had not only been briefed by the High Commission’s Ian Gleeson to the effect that the Princess did not like to ‘be crowded’ but had also read that the Princess was ‘antipress photographers’. But when he went to the President’s residence the President asked the Princess to come outside for a photo shoot. “These guys never seem to have enough” he joked. And instead of the customary posed line, popularly known as ‘the firing squad’ in media houses, the VIP’s stood in a way ‘which a film director would have cherished’. For five whole minutes the royal couple and their hosts stood facing the dull noon sun and admired and discussed the magnificent architectural structure of Ikulu. ‘I found myself putting the Princess Royal at the top of my list of favourite dignitaries, after Nelson Mandela, Mwalimu Nyerere, President Mkapa and ministers Jakaya Kikwete and Edward Lowassa’ all of whom show great concern for press photographers’ he wrote.
Minister of Local Government and Regional Administration Kingunge Ngombale-Mwiru has announced that he is moving the HQ of his ministry to the long-designated capital, Dodoma, in the near future -Daily Mail.
Minister for the Civil Service Jackson Makwetta was reported in the October 19 issue of the East African to have ordered all men in his ministry to be clean-shaven and to ‘look sharp’ from now on. Tanzanian men were said to have been infected by ‘Mandela fever’ and to be wearing flowery shirts. The paper recommends a competition to design a new national dress for Tanzania -entries to be judged by women as ‘everyone knows who wears the trousers in the house these days’ .
A new foundation -the Mkwawa Foundation -has been inaugurated. Its aim is to erect historical monuments in Iringa as part of the celebrations marking the death of Chief Mkwawa of the Hehe a century ago -Guardian.
There has been a serious leak of the November Form 4 ‘0’ level examination papers and the exams are to be repeated in January 1999. Two police officers will be assigned to each of the 750 secondary schools when the examinations are repeated. It is estimated that the financial loss might exceed $1.2 million. Education Minister Professor Kapuya, who was recalled from Paris when the crisis broke, has refused demands that he should resign -East African.
The Commonwealth Development Corporation (CDC) and other international agencies have launched the ‘Fedha Fund Ltd’, a new private equity fund capitalised at $13 million which has begun to make loans to Tanzanian companies wishing to expand or to have management buy-outs and buy-ins -Guardian.
The US Census Bureau believes that Tanzania’s population will reach about 40 million by 2010 but this is lower than was anticipated because of the AIDS epidemic affecting the country. Life expectancy is predicted to be 46.1 years in 20 10 compared with 60.7 years without the sharp rise in deaths due to AIDS -East African.
According to Michael Okema, writing in the East African, a new word is being used to describe government polices these days. In President Mwinyi’s time it was ‘ruksa’ (free for all); nowadays it is ‘ukapa’ -the shortage of money caused by the President’s stringent monetary policies.
Tanzania’s Joseph Marwa (34) a Prisons Inspector won the Africa professional middleweight boxing title in Dar es Salaam on August 9. He beat Lolengo ‘Saddam Hussein’ Mock from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Prime Minister Frederick Sumaye expressed his anger on August 22 on hearing that 16 young Tanzanians in the Tanzanian delegation to the World Youth Festival in Lisbon had absconded and not returned to Tanzania with the others -they had besmirched the good image of the country he said. Portuguese police were hunting for them.
At the meeting of the Heads of all secondary schools in Tanzania, Ilboru Secondary School in Arusha was selected as the school with the best overall performance. Second came St Mary Mazinde (Tanga), third was Mzumbe (Morogoro), fourth was Kifungilo (Lushoto) and fifth Mzizima (Dar es Salaam).
The firm ‘Cargill’ announced on August l3 that it would not be operating its two cotton ginneries (built in 1993 and 1997) during the rest of the 1998 cotton season because, after seven weeks of the season, it had bought only 900 tons compared with 18,000 tons at the same time the year before. Flooding in December 1997 had reduced the acreage planted and the world price was said to be insufficient to support price expectations of farmers and the cost of full taxes and levies. Cargill hoped to resume operations in the 1999 season.
The Amani Nature Reserve in the Eastern Usambara mountains was officially launched on September 29 by President Mkapa. He was told that the reserve was one ofthe 25 top bio-diversity sites in the world. Some 25% of the 2,800 fauna species there could not be found anywhere else -Daily News.
The Dar es Salaam ‘Daily Mail’ has been giving considerable publicity to what it describes as the ‘grisly Shinyanga witch hunts’. Some 20 people, especially older women, were being killed each month and, on one day in August, twelve 2 people were said to have been killed. The Shinyanga Regional Police Office was quoted as reporting that the killings were worst after the harvest when people could afford (about five cows per killing) to pay contract killers. The police could not offer any immediate solution ‘as witchcraft was so much entrenched in the region’.
President Mkapa spoke at the consecration ceremony on October 11 of the Reverend Donald Mtetemela as the fourth Anglican Archbishop in Tanzania. A capacity crowd filled the church in Iringa -Daily News.
A Japanese medical technician at Muhimbili, Rieko Anaoku, was killed by armed bandits at Mikocheni, Dar es Salaam on September 17 when she struggled with them. Foreign Minister Jakaya Kikwete delivered a condolence message at the funeral in Dar es Salaam. On October 5 seven main suspects in the case appeared in court on various charges including the theft of many other vehicles. -Daily News.
The Regional Commissioner in Iringa has instructed agricultural extension staff in his region to sign village registers and jot down remarks on the agricultural expertise they had offered to farmers. This would maintain a duty performance record he said.
A resident of Pawaga in Iringa District has been sentenced to 24 years in prison for killing a giraffe in the Ruaha National Park on December 14 1994. The giraffe was said to be worth Shs 420,000 and the magistrate said that he was giving a severe punishment because of the ‘alarming rate of poaching’ Daily Mail.
The government was forced to withdraw a Bill it presented to parliament which would have raised the retirement age in the public service from 55 to 60. MP’s said that many educated people were waiting for jobs in the civil service -The African.
Vice-President Dr Omar Ali Juma opened the renovated Olduvai Gorge Museum near Ngorongoro crater on October 15. Financial and technical support came from the Getty Conservation Institute in Los Angeles. A recent survey of government-sponsored students studying abroad indicated that there were 147 in the Commonwealth of Independent States (former Soviet Union), 98 in India, 73 in the USA, 62 in Britain, 39 in Poland, 26 in Bulgaria, 25 in China, 21 in Cuba, 11 in Hungary and 10 in Canada with smaller numbers in 9 other countries.
Tanzania’s 30-strong team at the Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur in September came back with three medals. Tanzania took the silver (Simon Mrashani) and bronze (Andrea Suja) medals in the marathon and the gold medal (Michael Yombayomba) took the gold in boxing -the first gold medal Tanzania has won at the Commonwealth Games. All three work in the Police service and were promoted on their return. Tanzania came 16th out of the 70 countries which took part.