By Adonis Byemelwa
October 14 is never just another
day. It carries a nation’s heartbeat, the day Julius Kambarage Nyerere, the
teacher and conscience of Tanzania, left us in 1999. For me, it holds an even
deeper ache: it is also my late father’s birthday. He would have turned
eighty-six today. Between these two fathers, Nyerere and my own, runs a quiet
thread of memory, conviction, and hope that refuses to die.
Nyerere’s presence was never about
power but principle. He led with humility, lived simply, and spoke truth even
when it hurt. He was not perfect; he never claimed to be, but he was honest
enough to question himself, his party, and his people.
His kind of poverty was not
failure; it was a moral stance. Today, that humility feels almost alien in a
political culture that worships wealth and punishes dissent.
We now live in a time where
criticism is treated as betrayal. Voices that once shaped our public debates
have fallen silent, some out of fear, others by force.
Journalists disappear, activists are
intimidated, and truth is twisted into propaganda. Nyerere’s dream of a taifa—a
nation united by shared purpose—has withered into a nchi, a state held
together by institutions but drained of spirit. A nation liberates; a state
merely manages.
Amid this moral fog, a few still
dare to speak. One such voice is Bishop Benson Bagonza of Karagwe—a modern echo
of Nyerere’s conscience. He reminds us that development without justice is a
betrayal of humanity, and that poverty maintained by greed is sin. Like
Nyerere, he doesn’t shout; he reasons. His courage lies not in defiance but in
moral clarity.
Meanwhile, the mwenge—the
national torch Nyerere once lit to symbolize unity and enlightenment, still
travels across the country. But its flame feels dimmer now, reduced to ceremony
and spectacle. The torch still burns, yes, but too often without purpose.
This is the paradox of our
commemoration: we celebrate Nyerere’s ideals while quietly betraying them. We
mistake peace for silence and unity for obedience. Nyerere’s peace was rooted
in justice, his unity built on dialogue. Today, leadership feels transactional,
and citizens are treated as mere voters rather than partners in nationhood.
Perhaps our decline began when we
stopped believing that ethics belong in politics—when truth became negotiable,
and courage became optional. Yet, as Aristotle once said, “Courage is the first
of human qualities because it guarantees the others.” Without courage, justice
is just a slogan, and faith becomes ritual.
So, on this Nyerere Day, as the
nation rests, the real question is whether we are resting in reflection—or in
forgetfulness.
But not all hope is gone. The real
torch still burns in the hearts of ordinary Tanzanians, the farmer who refuses
to cheat his neighbor, the teacher who nurtures minds in underfunded
classrooms, the youth who still believe that decency is not weakness. Nyerere’s
spirit lives not in monuments or state speeches, but in the daily acts of
honesty that defy cynicism.
As we approach another election
season, the irony deepens. We are compelled to join parties to be chosen, yet
the vote we cast is demanded without question of party. Democracy, stripped of
dignity, has become a ritual of consent rather than conviction. Corruption has
normalized, and those who expose it are treated as enemies of the state. We are
invited to feasts of rice and rhetoric, and afterward, we return to hunger, hunger
not only of the stomach, but of truth.
What would Nyerere say to us today?
He would probably remind us that leadership is not domination but service; that
the purpose of power is to protect the weak, not to exploit them.
He would mourn the betrayal of ethics, but he
would not despair. His faith in humanity was too resilient for that. He would
challenge us to remember that justice delayed is still injustice, and that
freedom postponed is already lost.
Our way forward must begin with
restoring trust. We must reopen spaces for dialogue, not as political gestures
but as moral obligations. We must demand accountability not as vengeance, but
as healing.
We must protect truth-tellers and
rebuild institutions so that justice no longer depends on courage alone. Above
all, we must nurture a culture of thought—a return to critical inquiry in our
schools, our churches, and our media.
Bishop Bagonza has often said that
moral decay begins when we normalize wrongs in small doses. He is right. The
collapse of nations begins not with coups but with concessions. When we stop
asking questions, when we stop defending the vulnerable, when we allow fear to
define decency, we become accomplices in our own undoing.
Nyerere once said, “No nation has
the right to exist if it cannot serve the people who live in it.” That
sentence, once a warning to colonial powers, now boomerangs back at us. The
test of our independence is not how long we have been free, but how honestly we
live that freedom.
And so, on the 14th of October, as
Tanzania commemorates Nyerere Day, we are called not to nostalgia but to
awakening. To remember him is not to idealize him, but to measure ourselves
against the ideals he lived for: truth, service, equality, and moral courage.
He must not die again in our silence.
When he passed in London, the world
mourned a philosopher-king. Today, we must mourn our own moral drift. Yet
mourning must give way to movement. The challenge is no longer to imitate
Nyerere, but to inherit his restlessness—the conviction that justice is never
finished, that truth must always disturb comfort.
October 14 carries the weight of
two memories—the passing of Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere and the birthday
of my late father. Between these two fathers, I find both comfort and
challenge: a reminder that leadership, whether in a nation or a family, is
measured not by power, but by conscience.
From Dar es Salaam, the Catholic Archbishop
Jude Thadaeus Ruwa’ichi, OFMCap, spoke with the calm authority of one who knows
that silence can be costly. He condemned the wave of abductions that has
scarred Tanzania for nearly fifteen years, calling them “a wound to the
nation’s soul.”
Citing Article 8 of the
Constitution, he reminded the country that human dignity and rights are not
favors of the state but its moral foundation. Referring to Article 14, he was
blunt: “The government’s first duty is to protect life. No one, no office, no
uniform, has the right to take what only God gives.”
The archbishop’s question still
echoes: How can abductors move freely while law enforcers look away? His lament
cut deep—fear has become familiar, and accountability remains absent. He urged
the nation to reclaim its moral compass before fear becomes our default
language.
Between Nyerere’s memory and my
father’s silence, I sense both mourning and resolve. Nyerere’s mwenge—his
torch—was never meant for spectacle but for moral illumination. It was meant to
awaken us, not distract us.
Let us, then, rekindle that inner
mwenge—the flame of conscience that outlasts censorship and ceremony alike. For
though the official torch may dim, the true light still burns where integrity
dwells.
If we are to honor the servant of
truth, we must become servants of truth ourselves. Only then can we say,
without irony, that Mwalimu has not died—he lives in those who dare to
remember, to question, and to believe that Tanzania can still be both a nation
and a promise kept.