Tanzania, ice cream and international scientific controversy wouldn’t win many points in a word association game. But add the name ‘Mpemba’ and there is a link. ‘Tanzanian Affairs’ has uncovered a mystery that began in ancient Greece, resurfaced in 1960’s Tanga and has since ricocheted around university labs the world over.

And we exclusively trace the Tanzanian boy at the centre of the puzzle. His name now fills reruns of scientific journals but at the time he was mocked by his classmates as the ‘black sheep’ of the class.

Erasto Mpemba was the ‘black sheep’. He takes up the story in ‘Physics Education’. “In 1963 when I was in Form 3 in Magamba Secondary School, Tanzania I used to make ice cream. The boys at the school do this by boiling milk, mixing it with sugar and putting it into the freezing chamber in the refrigerator …. a lot of boys make it and there is a rush to get space”. One day Mpemba began boiling milk but another boy dashed to grab the space. Rather than miss his chance Mpemba acted rashly. “I decided to risk ruin to the refrigerator on that day by putting hot milk into it”. His gamble led to a strange discovery.

“The other boy and I went back an hour and a half later and found that my tray of milk had frozen into ice cream while his was still only a thick liquid not yet frozen.” The gamble paid off, but set in motion a chain of events that went far beyond a cool lick in sweltering Tanga town.

Mpemba had discovered a phenomenon that had been observed before but never explained. Sometimes, against all our intuitions, warm liquid freezes faster than cold.

Aristotle noticed this in the fourth century and wrote: ” … many people when they want to cool water quickly begin by putting it in the sun … “. Mpemba said that the ice cream makers of Tanga were among them. Before ice cream was even thought about in Tanga, and almost two millennia after Aristotle, the French philosopher Descartes observed: “… water which has been kept for a long time on the fire freezes faster than other water”. Twenty years before the English civil war Francis Bacon noted the same. So did scientist Marliani in Renaissance Italy.

But the mystery remained unsolved, tossed aside by the scientific community like a stone in the shoe of the new physics which could not explain it. Mpemba put the stone back.

But before the world would take notice another person entered the story. Six years after Mpemba’s discovery, Denis Osborne, Professor of Physics at the University of Dar es Salaam, went to speak in Mkwawa High School. Osborne recalls in ‘Physics Education’ that he faced a variety of questions from students: “How do I get to University?”, “What does the syllabus have to do with development?” but almost thirty years later one question still sticks in his mind.

“Why did hot water freeze more quickly than cold?” Mpemba was persistent – he had asked this question before. His first physics lesson on arriving at Mkwawa High School was on heat. Mpemba recalls the scene:

“One day as our teacher taught us about Newton’s Law of Cooling, I asked him the question “Please Sir, why is it that when you put both hot milk and cold milk into a refrigerator at the same time, the hot milk freezes first?” The teacher replied: “I do not think so, Mpemba”. “1 continued: It is true, Sir, I have done it myself’. And he said: “The answer I can give is that you were confused.” “I kept on arguing, and the final answer he gave me was that: “Well all I can say is that Mpemba’s physics is not the universal physics”.

“From then onwards if I failed in a problem by making a mistake in looking up the logarithms this teacher used to say: “That is Mpemba’s physics”. And the whole class adopted this, and any time I did something wrong they used to say to me “That is Mpemba’s …. whatever the thing was”.

Despite ridicule Mpemba adopted a pitbull-like persistence. Once he stole into an empty lab and ran through an experiment with beakers of warm and cold water and again found the same result. When Denis Osborne turned up at the school, he thought he might at last get an answer. Mpemba continues: “He first smiled and asked me to repeat the question. After I repeated it he said: “Is it true? Have you done it?” I said: “Yes”. Then he said: “I do not know but I promise to try this experiment when I am back in Dar es Salaam.” Osborne recalls: “It was a surprising question. I thought he was wrong. On my way back to Dar es Salaam in the car I worked out that he must be wrong in theory.” But Osborne held true to his promise Although Mpemba’s classmates would soon be laughing on the other side of their faces, they continued to rib him. “Next day, my classmates in Form 4 were saying to me that I had shamed them by asking that question and that my aim was to ask a question that Dr Osborne would not be able to answer. Some said to me: “But Mpemba, did you understand your chapter on Newton’s law of cooling?” I told them: “Theory differs from practical”. Some said: “We do not wonder, for that was Mpemba’s physics:’

Osborne was surprised when a technician at University College in Dar tried the experiment and he saw the results. He set about trying to explain them, coming up with a few possible explanations, and publishing material in various journals.

Recently the debate was re-ignited in the pages of the ‘New Scientist’ – exposing the same scepticism faced by Mpemba.

Norman Gardiner in Cheshire wondered whether Mpemba knew that his name had entered the language and that scientists were still debating the question that he put to Professor Osborne 30 years later. Charles Knight of the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado recommended readers of the ‘New Scientist’ to read a paper which had been published in ‘The Transactions of the American Philosophical Society’ in 1948 under the heading ‘The Freezing of Supercooled Water’ but J Jocelyn from the Scottish Universities Research and Reactor Centre warned readers that this extended to 80 pages! Tom Trull from the University of Tasmania wrote: “This is a cultural myth.” But his colleague Michael Davis from the same university countered: ” … it is possible to produce ice cubes more quickly by using initially hot water instead of cold”. Matti Jarvilehto at the University of Oulu in Finland. writing in the New Scientist’s ‘Last Word’ section, reported on a similar effect in an electric sauna. “By fooling the temperature sensor by splashing water I increased the oven’s output” he wrote.

With the controversy having been re-opened in Tanzania by Mpemba the solution could come from elsewhere in Africa. South African physicist David Auerbach working in Germany thinks he knows the answer.

“It’s all to do with super cooling” Auerbach was reported as saying in the ‘New Scientist’ in late 1995. After 103 experiments he found that the Mpemba effect is not an iron law – sometimes warm water and sometimes cold water freezes first. The explanation lies in branching ‘ferns’ of ice. These shoot out from the walls of beakers full of water as it just begins to freeze. Auerbach says that this is a sign of super cooling. The Mpemba effect occurs with this super cooling. The sudden appearance of ‘ferns’ of ice crystals from the super cooled liquid occurs at a higher temperature in water that was originally hot. This means that warm water can freeze quicker than cold.

But will Mpemba’s discovery lead to any new inventions? Osborne is not sure. “Among other things the effect is quite erratic. It depends on random vibrations and wafts of air so you get different effects on different occasions.” This could limit its practical applications. Yet whether the Mpemba effect solves the world’s energy crisis or patches the hole in the ozone layer it undoubtedly affected the people involved.

“Surprising questions are fun. They are not to be despised,” says Osborne. “One piece that’s to my credit is that I did not despise, I went off and researched it.” Osborne has pursued a distinguished career in science education. Mpemba’s life has followed a different path since the two parted company in 1969 after they published their joint paper in ‘Physics Education’.

FINDING ERASTO MPEMBA
Finding a one-time physics student in a country the size of Tanzania seemed, at first, like a daunting task. But after tracking down Professor Osborne in Britain, the task became straightforward as they had remained in touch with each other. In Dar es Salaam, after a tip off from a Security guard at the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, we tracked him down to the “Ivory Room” in Changombe, Dar es Salaam. This is where the big annual sale of Tanzanian ivory used to be held before marketing the tusks was banned. Ivory is still stored there from elephants that are damaging crops and have to be killed.

Mpemba’s work with wildlife means that he is no stranger to elephants. “We were on control work in Dodoma some years ago” he said. “We met a big herd. The leader dominating the herd was tuskless. They were ruining peoples crops. He had to go. But he decided to die with us”. “I aimed between the eyes. He went down. He stood up again and charged. I shot him again at 50 yards. I shot him for a third time, a fourth time. A fifth time. He was over my head. As he finally fell, his body grazed my leg.”

But run-ins with elephants were not what Mpemba always had in mind. Originally he wanted to be a doctor but his parents did not have the money to pay for the training, he said. Seeing work with wildlife as the best way to an overseas scholarship he ended up at the Mweka Wildlife College. After getting his diploma he was promoted to Regional Natural Resources Officer in Mara Region in 1967. It was eight years before he achieved his ambition of foreign study. In Australia he got a degree in Natural Resources Management. Today Mpemba is Principal Assistant Game officer working with communities to involve more people in conservation.

Funnily enough his wife is a doctor. But science does not seem to run in the family. “And your children, are there any budding physicists among them?” we asked. “No. They are not doing at all well in physics” he replied. Mpemba may have done more for science than science has done for him. Osborne says: “He is slightly cynical about the whole thing and says people are making too much fuss about it. He did badly in his physics exam”. But if the Mpemba effect does lead to some new advance it will not be a first for Africa. “Some aspects of environmental science and drugs taken from natural sources are being pioneered by Africans and people in other developing countries,” says Osborne.

And Mpemba’s lesson is more than just about the properties of water. How many students in the high tech labs of British schools have made a similar contribution to science understanding? And how many teachers have dismissed students who go against the textbooks? The “black sheep of the class” may have done badly in his physics exam but he has taught a lesson to students and teachers the world over.
Matthew Green

(The heavily guarded Ivory Room is still in use. 144 elephant tusks, disguised as boat spare parts and believed to be from the mainland were recently seized at Zanzibar airport. This brings the total stock of ivory in the Room to some 60 tonnes worth $6 million. The fate of this ivory is to be decided at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species meeting in Harare in July – Editor).

The tortoise is threatened with extinction in Zanzibar because they are being taken away for sale to ships in Dar es Salaam harbour. But now, according to the ‘Business Times’, they are to be provided with special devices to be implanted in the shells which will respond to the touch and so trigger a signal directly to a monitoring centre to show that the animal is probably in trouble. It is one of the new technologies being used to protect endangered species the world over.

The report of the judicial commission investigating the loss of the MV Bukoba, which sank in Lake Victoria with the loss of 700 lives last May (TA No 55) was published on September 6 and spread the blame widely – the Tanzania Railways corporation’s Marine Division for operating the vessel without due care (it had a long-standing stability problem yet on its final voyage it was overloaded, there was improper storage of cargo and inadequate ballasting); the division was said to have been characterised by gross negligence , inefficiency and corruption; the government was blamed for buying a defective ship (although this was partially because of a lack of expertise on the Tanzanian side and the crisis in Lake shipping caused by the collapse at the time of the East African community’s Lake steamer services; this had placed Tanzania in a weak bargaining position with the suppliers); and the Belgian shipbuilders (BSC) for supplying a vessel which did not correspond to the specifications and for not giving the users adequate guidelines on the extremely delicate handling the ship required. The report also described as ‘regrettable’ the failure of the Belgian government to finance promised rehabilitation work on the ship. The Belgian government has since refused to pay compensation to the victims stating that the shipbuilders (who are believed to have gone out of business) were responsible. But the matter remained under discussion in the Belgian parliament.

The Director of Public Prosecutions announced on November 27 that criminal charges were being prepared against a number of people in connection with the tragedy.

morning
I wake in darkness. Through the morning coolness and a packed ground comes the steady ‘thud, thud, thud’ of Zawadi preparing breakfast with her sister. The ‘Today’ programme on Radio 4; the six o’clock news with Jumbe Omari Jumbe. Outside, the soft rain cuts through the cold mist which blurs the orange street lights as I wait for my morning lift. Jodie furrows her brow, brushes crumbs of toast and chocolate off her chemistry homework and glances at the furious action on the video. seven-thirty, the sun already high in a pure sky, I walk slowly up through the village towards the school; footsteps and dragged leaves behind pause briefly into ‘Shhhikamoo’ and then Zawadi rushes away to beat the late bell.

assemblies
Spread like a net over the slopes of the school grounds, the students slash the grass short, each in their assigned area. Prefects and class monitors supervise. Those near the drive stand to attention “Good Morning Sir” and my bag rushes away ahead of me. The bell is rung again and students sweeping their classroom hurry to join their fellows on the parade ground. The Headmaster arrives and teachers join the students at attention, sing the National Anthem as the Flag is raised. “Good morning, everybody!” “Good morning, Sir!”. The Headmaster addresses the school for some ten minutes in English. School fees must be paid soon. Next week, pupils who have not yet paid fees for at least half the year of 4,000 shillings (or roughly four pounds) will be sent home to get it. Attendance is poor. People are picking oranges to earn money instead of coming and studying! The students have brought in woven palm leaves to contribute to a school income generating project; these are stacked under the prefect’s direction and then they go into their classrooms. Zawadi’s form have an English lesson first.

Jodie is chatting with three friends, eating crisps. The boy’s half of the room buzzes with last night’s big football match, seen live on TV. The ref was a MORON! …• “Morning all” I say, entering with the register. “Sir, you’re so sad!” says Jodie. After a few minutes I persuade them to stop discussing Manchester United, East Enders and the fate of baby seals long enough to answer the register. I hastily collect parent’s notes from those who have been absent. Then we go off to assembly. The room, cleaned by contract cleaners the previous evening, is already messy with chewing gum wrappers and trodden-in crisps.

“Good morning, Year 10”. ‘MmmmmmggMsss’. The Head of Year addresses the students in English. She reads a short story with the moral ‘always treat other people the way you want to be treated yourself’. This is taken from a commercially produced book of such stories specifically aimed at school assemblies. She goes on to talk about the problem of bullying which has been surfacing again. Jodie kicks the leg of her friend’s chair and asks her what lesson is first? French.

modern languages
Both teachers address their students in a foreign language. “If I had a lot of money I would buy a nice house”. “Who can give us another sentence like that? .. Quiet … Four thousand miles apart, two girls stare at their desks … Quiet ….

“Zawadi!”. “Jodie!” “Have a go” … Quiet … muffled laughter … a long. long pause, then … (both) “If …. I have .. ah, … had a lot of money …. I go in America”.
“Excellent! Thank You, … let me help you improve the second part”.

Later, both classes are working in pairs to prepare short dialogues to be performed in front of their friends. The English students are basing their work on their French textbooks; the Tanzanian students are using English story books provided by the British Council. Jodie and Zawadi are encouraged by their success and try hard. However, they find the work difficult. There are so many words to look up. Many of the teacher’s instructions, although simple, are hard for them to fully grasp. By the end of a full lesson using a foreign language, both feel themselves adrift in mists of incomprehension.

chemistry
Both Chemistry teachers say in English “Today we will investigate what happens when we add certain kinds of things, certain substances, to water”

Zawadi’s teacher starts at the top-left corner of the board, writing and dictating, still in English. ‘To dissolve is defined as to change into a liquid state, especially by the process of immersion in water. The resultant solution will be determinalistically configured in its own chemical properties by 1. The valency and ….. ‘ For Zawadi the mists have thickened to deep fog. In her exercise book, the second sentence reads: ‘The resultand solution will determinally configured in by the nature of the nature … ‘

Jodie, freed from the confusions of French, can at least put her energies into struggling with Chemistry. Her teacher asks: “What properties might we measure during such an investigation?” Some students suggest ‘temperature’, ‘colour’, ‘mass’. Jodie wants to suggest ‘pH’ but doesn’t want to be called a ‘keener’ by her friends. Next, the class are shown a video on ‘solutions’. It demonstrates various laboratory investigations and shows some industrial and commercial applications such as the clothing and fashion business. Afterwards, the class work in small groups in a well equipped laboratory. Jodie respects this teacher and wants to try hard but she has very little confidence in herself. She can’t see the point of trying to measure too accurately. The teacher has to spend some of her time with a group of boys who are being quite noisy. Eventually, one of then breaks Jodie’s flask with a coin thrown from across the room; the teacher tells him to stand outside.

Meanwhile Zawadi is copying down descriptions of similar experiments and the equipment needed, in her third blackboard full of English notes. “So, what is the definition of ‘dissolve?'” asks her teacher. The first two boys have no idea and are left standing up. Then …. “ah …. a girl .. Zawadi!” She stands up, half panic, half resignation. Silence …. Suddenly the word ‘dislove’ leaps to her from her exercise book. Clutching at the chance, she reads out the first sentence and a half. “Excellent! sit down”. The two boys are called out to the front. The teacher chuckles, “wewe! Dadako anakupitia!???”. Three strokes from the teacher’s stick. The rest of the class roar with laughter.

For homework, both classes have to write up the experiment.

break
The bell goes in my classroom. Fifteen minutes break. I rush around putting away boxes of teaching resources and computers, simultaneously interrogating a student about missing maths homework. I get into the staffroom with eleven minutes left, put teabag and water into cup. “Could I have a quick word?” says Jodie’s Chemistry teacher. She explains “….. they are outside”. I go to the door – via two more conversations with colleagues about meetings and test dates. Five minutes left. After talking to Jodie and the boy outside in the rain I rush back in. Take out teabag, add milk, listen to announcement about problems with central heating, sit down. One minute left.

Around 11 o’clock the teachers start to gather in the Tanzanian staffroom. “No tea yet? Tell them to hurry!”. We have about an hour, or as long as necessary. I send a student off with 70 shillings (about 70p) to the market to buy some deep fried cassava, chips and oranges. Students come in with jugs of hot black tea and pour it for each teacher at their desk. The Headmaster leads discussion of a few matters such as the holiday shamba rota. One student comes in and asks the duty teacher for permission to travel to his home village to collect food. Another asks permission to go to the hospital; this is quite rare now that the students have to pay 200 shillings to see the doctor themselves and then buy any drugs prescribed. Many struggle on with skin conditions, bad teeth, malaria.

During break, Jodie’s friends huddle in a sheltered doorway from the cold November wind. Boys are playing football on the field and tarmaced areas. The teacher on duty, wrapped in a thick coat, stalks along the edge of the field towards the sheds where the cigarette smokers usually hide.

The Tanzanian students stream up towards the hot dusty market. They will gather round the chip selling stalls; some to spend their 10 or 20 shillings, most just to join the conversations. Zawadi watches a group of boys re-enacting the commentary from last night’s big football match, heard live on radio. “Refu MPUMBAVU!”

I hope readers will forgive my poetic licence with some time differences.
Rob Grant

NEW VOLUNTEERS
A further group of 27 British VSO volunteers arrived in Tanzania in August bringing the total number to 100 in the country. They included teachers, agricultural specialists, social workers, pharmacists, technicians, accountants and educators.

THE WORLD’S SHORTEST WAR
The Daily News reported on August 27 about a photographic exhibition being put on by the Zanzibar Department of Archaeology to mark the British bombardment of Zanzibar in what was described as ‘the world’s shortest war’ – two and a half hours – a century ago. The war involved the bombardment of Sultan Khalid’s Palace (now known as the House of Wonders) to force him to hand over his powers to a Sultan of Britain’s choice. Museums Curator Professor Abdul Shariff said that from the date of the protectorate in 1890 the British were the actual rulers of Zanzibar and that the Arab Sultans were mere figureheads – Daily News

“AT THE TOP OF OUR LIST”
A year after the UN’s fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, Susan Kindervatter of the non-profit ‘Inter Action Coalition’ said on August 22 that Tanzania was clearly in the running for a gold medal as far as implementation of the resolutions of the conference was concerned. Tanzania had presented one of the most comprehensive lists of commitments and was already taking action to increase the number of women in governmental decision-making positions to a minimum of 30% by the year 2,000 she said. The other front runners were the Philippines and Uganda – The Express, Dar es salaam.

THE END OF THE LITTLE THEATRE
The celebrated Dar es Salaam ‘Little Theatre’ which has seen many fine performances over several decades, will shortly be converted into an apartment hotel with 48 flats, swimming pool, bar and restaurant and conference facilities. Investors include players and actors of the theatre – Business Times.

WHICH ARE THE HISTORIC BUILDINGS?
In the last issue of TA there was an article headed ‘The Demolition of Dar’. On September 15 a Mr Mchume wrote to the Daily News on the same subject. He deplored the planned transformation of Dar es Salaam into a concrete jungle and listed the buildings he thought should be preserved. These included the Cosy Cafe, The White Fathers building, St. Joseph’s Cathedral, the Arab Mosque, the British Council Library, Ocean Road Hospital, the Forodhani Hotel, the Lutheran Church and the Botanic Gardens. There were many others he said.

A TERRIBLE YEAR
Anne Outwater writing in the Daily News (October 19) reported that for the chimpanzees at the Gombe Stream National Park 1996 had been a terrible year. Following cold and rainy weather in March many chimps had come down with serious respiratory infections and one third of the population of about 30 were reported either dead or missing. The regional veterinarian had recommended daily antibiotic treatment but getting the chimps to take the pills proved difficult. So each pill was divided into six or seven bananas and “luckily, chimps never get tired of bananas”.

In our last issue an article under this heading described the development now underway of the significant natural gas deposits at Songo Songo, Kilwa and mentioned the indignation of many people in southern Tanzania because the gas is not to be used in Kilwa but piped to Dar es salaam for conversion into electricity. The Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation (TPDF) has since placed large advertisements in the press to explain why this decision was taken. Firstly, it was said to be cheaper and safer to transport gas than electricity and none of the energy was lost en route (compared with up to 20% in the case of electricity); it was easier to hook in the gas along the route for other uses (16 villages would have their own gas-generated power stations) but this would be very expensive with high tension electric wires; power generation alone would not have been economical unless industrial use of the gas was included in the project and this could be done only in Dar es Salaam where large industries existed. The advertisements emphasised that the pipes would be made of special material that could not be easily punctured and would be laid a metre underground.

A big fertiliser plant employing 2,000 people is expected to be built at Kilwa Masoko. Gas at Mnazi Bay is to be used to provide electricity to Lindi and Mtwara.

In what many considered to be a disaster on a par with that of the ‘Titanic’ in 1912 (over 1,500 people perished) some 700 people died when the Lake Victoria passenger ship ‘M V Bukoba’ capsized on May 21 just 30 minutes before reaching Mwanza port. Only 53 people survived. President Mkapa declared three days of national mourning. Governments and individuals all over the world sent their condolences.

Eye witness survivors told how the ship was loaded with many more than its 433-passenger capacity should have allowed. At eight am, with Mwanza in sight the ship began to sway. Huge jikos, dishes and kitchen equipment in the restaurant crashed to one side; the loud bang created a panic and as people rushed to the deck the vessel turned over. Ironically, the vast quantity of Bukoba bananas the passengers had earlier asked the crew to throw overboard, later helped survivors by giving them something to cling on to in the water. There were not enough lifebelts. The vessel remained on the surface, partially buoyant. But then rescuers, who could hear trapped passengers screaming and banging, ignored the pleas of fishermen, and decided to drill a hole into the hull to rescue those trapped inside. The effect however was to release the air which had kept the hull afloat and shortly after 3 pm the boat sank.

Several hundred bodies were extracted with great difficulty by divers – people in the packed third class compartment of the ship had linked arms in solidarity before they died and it proved extremely difficult to break them free. Most of the bodies of the dead were buried in mass graves in Mwanza. An old lady in Kagera Region collapsed and died after learning that her daughter and three grandchildren had perished. One victim, a Ugandan businessman, was found to be carrying $27,000 in notes.

On May 29 the captain of the ship and eight senior officials of the Tanzania Railways Corporation Marine Department were charged in court with the murder of 615 people and were remanded in custody. They were later released. On the same day Prime Minister Frederick Sumaye announced the appointment of a Commission of Enquiry under Judge Robert Kisanga which included five other Tanzanians and six foreign experts.

On June 2 President Mkapa halted any further recovery of decomposed bodies from the wreck as this posed a health hazard to divers who had come from South Africa, Kenya and Zanzibar. 392 bodies had been recovered. At a joint service of remembrance on June 3 Chief Justice Nyalali spread a handful of soil on the lake as a burial symbol. The wreckage, which lies 27 metres below lake level, became a permanent tomb for those whose bodies could not be recovered.

ARUSHA – A TOWN OF STRANGERS
VUGHA – A HISTORICAL MISINTERBRETATATION
DAR ES SALAAM – THE PROBLEM OF THE ‘DETRIBALISED’ AFRICANS
ZANZIBAR – DYSFUNCTIONAL COLONIALISM

A conference (with almost 200 participants) entitled ‘Africa’s Urban Past’ at the London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) from June 19 to 21 1966 was not without pungent expressions of opinion about various aspects of the Tanzanian (or Tanganyikan) experience of urban development.

Thomas Spear of the University of Wisconsin-Madison in his paper (TOWN AND COUNTRY: ARUSHA AND ITS HINTERLAND) described Arusha’s history in some detail: from its original establishment by the Maasai in the 1830’s’ through its function as the last stop for caravans in the 1860’s; the erection of the ‘boma’ by the Germans (‘it was meant to impress – it even had electricity’); and the British notion of Arusha as a ‘garden centre’ with its carefully segregated high, medium and low density residential areas; ‘the Europeans lived above and to windward of the Africans’; land was ‘seized from the African population for golf courses, tennis courts and other European social amenities’. Throughout it all the town remained resolutely divorced from its hinterland and was populated by ‘strangers’ – Colonial officers, European shop keepers, settlers, Indian merchants, Chagga, Pare, Somali and Swahili traders – relentlessly expanding at the Arusha farmers’ expense.

In what turned out to be a controversial paper (‘A HEAP OF HUTS? VUGHA AND THE NATURE OF THE KILINDI STATE) Justin Willis of the British Institute in Eastern Africa spoke about the ‘Shambaa Kingdom’, a pre-colonial polity in what is now north-eastern Tanzania. The residence of the hereditary rulers, from the Kilindi clan, was at Vugha, in the mountains of Western Usambaa; when first visited by European observers in the mid-nineteenth century, Vugha, with perhaps 3,000 inhabitants, represented an unusual concentration of population for the region. The object of Willis’ paper was to argue that the presence of such a settlement close to the normal residence of the ruler, led European observers to make certain assumptions about the Kilindi state which were mistaken. Burton had described it as a ‘heap of huts’. Kilindi had not been a centralised polity; Vugha was not the capital of the state; nor was it even a single settlement.

When Britain took over responsibility for Tanganyika from the Germans in 1919 they inherited in Dar es Salaam a situation of urban lawlessness amongst the 20,000 African population said Andrew Burton of SOAS in his paper CRIME AND COLONIAL ORDER IN DAR ES SALAAM, 1918-39. The behavioural constraints of the ‘tribal society’ no longer applied in the multi-ethnic urban environment and this lack of constraints resulted in the emergence of that bogeyman of colonial society, the ‘detribalised African’, he said. A prominent area in which colonial law clashed with African notions of legitimacy were the regulations controlling the production and consumption of alcohol. Liquor laws were rigidly enforced – they helped to reduce drunkenness and increased the reliability of the African worker. Prostitution was considered legitimate not only by the African population but also, effectively by the state; laws prohibiting it were not implemented.

The paper by William Bissell of the University of Chicago (CONSERVATION AND THE COLONIAL PAST: URBAN PLANNING, LAW AND POWER IN ZANZIBAR) consisted of a rather intemperate attack on the five urban planning documents produced there since 1919 which, the author said, had remained unimplemented. Whatever the political jurisdiction, officials had ‘repeatedly demonstrated an almost unshakable faith in the ability of a comprehensive town plan to solve all problems … the immense disparity between the bureaucratic resources, time and energy devoted to planning and its meagre results might seem astounding … but in the colonial milieu plan-making and inertia were not opposed activities, indeed they directly implied and depended upon each other.

The author went on to put the knife into colonialism – ‘parts of the plans which were actually built invariably related to the colonial economy – improvement of traffic networks and transport or port rehabilitation. At least until the revolution, pressing social needs like housing, which were often put forward as the raison d’etre of the plans, were continually postponed …… What Zanzibar reflects is the degree to-which legal contradiction, bureaucratic ineptness, official obfuscation. prolonged inaction and petty adherence to formality – all reinforced by a total lack of accountability – were powerful tools of colonial power…. The fact that this was unintentional makes it no less powerful’ – DRB.

Tanzania has the largest tsetse mass-rearing facility in Africa and the largest tsetse colony of over 600,000 female flies – the largest in the world, according to Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Dr. Hans Blix, quoted in the Daily News. Although tsetse flies were a menace to the health of people and livestock, he said, still there was a need to reproduce them en masse. The flies are reared at the Tanga-based Tsetse and Trypanosomiasis Research Institute and the male flies are made sterile using gamma radiation from cobalt 60 or caesium 137 sources before their release in tsetse affected areas. Tanzania was said to be in a leadership position and could soon begin exporting flies which would help to decimate tsetse populations in other countries. Dr. Blix inaugurated a third insect rearing facility at Tanga during his visit to Tanzania.