Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli was pronounced dead yesterday by the vice President, Samia Suluhu.

Appearing live on TV, she said that Mr Magufuli died on Wednesday at 6pm from heart complication, at a hospital in Dar es Salaam.

Born in 1959, Magufuli was 61 years old.

Preceding Jakaya Kikwete, John Pombe Magufuli will be succeeded by Suluhu Hassan.

According to the Tanzanian constitution, Vice President Samia Suluhu Hassan will be sworn in as Tanzania President and will lead for the remainder of Magufuli’s term until 2025. Magufuli had just been re-elected in November last year.

If followed as by constitution, Suluhu will become the first female President of Tanzania and the entire East African bloc.

Controversy surrounding Magufuli’s death:

• Tanzania’s Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa on Friday: President Magufuli is “strong and working as usual”.

• Tanzania’s Vice-president Samia Suluhu Hassan on Monday: Our country is now full of rumours from outside but that should be ignored… It’s quite normal for a person to contract flu, fever or any other disease.

• Vice-president Samia Suluhu Hassan on Wednesday: It is with deep regret that I inform you that today on the 17th of March, 2021 at 6:00 pm we lost our brave leader, the President of the Republic of Tanzania, John Pombe Magufuli.”

Taking you 17 days back before Magufuli was pronounced dead;

“Where is Tanzania’s President John Magufuli?” People have been asking for the past 17 days since the 61-year-old had last been seen in public, and despite a clamour of rumours of ill-health, the Tanzanian authorities had yet to provide clear answers as to his whereabouts, until yesterday.

The mere question was now leading to arrests, as the government sought to contain the rumours.

Critical analysts however emphasised that the silence was speaking volumes. They insisted that the efforts to silence queries about Magufuli’s health was telling alot and so worrying.

“I think whatever happens is clearly true the regime is trying to buy time,” said a one Nic Cheeseman, professor of democracy at the University of Birmingham.

“And it only really makes sense that the regime is trying to buy time if the president is very ill, incapacitated, or dead,” he added.

Magufuli last appeared in public on February 27, and the fervent Catholic had notably missed three Sunday services, where he would often address the congregation.

Just days before, Finance Minister Philip Mpango appeared coughing and gasping at a press conference outside a hospital, to dispel rumours he had died of Covid-19.

Fended Off By Prayer

Magufuli’s absence came amid a string of high-profile deaths and illnesses attributed to “respiratory problems” or “pneumonia”.

Magufuli had for months insisted the virus no longer existed in Tanzania, and had been fended off by prayer. He refused to wear a face-mask or take lockdown measures.

The country stopped releasing case data in April 2020.

But a week before he was last seen, Magufuli conceded the virus was still circulating, after the vice-president of semi-autonomous Zanzibar was revealed to have died of Covid-19.

Last Tuesday, main opposition leader Tundu Lissu, exiled in Belgium, and others began questioning Magufuli’s absence, citing sources that he was gravely ill from Covid-19, exacerbated by underlying health conditions.

Gov’t Tasked To Tell The Truth!

On Monday, Lissu said on Twitter that his intelligence sources “said he’s on life support with COVID and paralysed on one side and from the waist down after a stroke. Tell the people the truth!”

Among the theories in circulation was that Magufuli has been severely ill in a hospital in Kenya or India, while another suggested he never left Tanzania at all.

Kenyan media had reported the presence of “an African leader” in a Nairobi hospital in clear reference to Magufuli, although government officials denied he was present.

India’s foreign ministry did not respond to requests for a comment.

Cheeseman said it was “remarkable” that the government had kept Magufuli’s whereabouts under wraps “in the modern world of the internet and citizen reporting and social media”.

“But Tanzania isn’t living in that modern world. The level of media censorship means Tanzania is not in that context.”

The Tanzanian government had said very little, other than to threaten those spreading rumours with jail time.

Gov’t Emphasises Unity

On Friday, Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa said Magufuli was “strong and working as usual”.

On Monday, vice-president Samia Suluhu Hassan dropped a possible hint the president is ill, without naming him.

“Our country is now full of rumours from outside but that should be ignored… It’s quite normal for a person to contract flu, fever or any other disease,” she said.

“If there’s need for us to remain united, the time is now.”

Zitto Kabwe, the leader of opposition party ACT-Wazalendo, said the government was merely giving room for panic.

“We know for sure that the president is ill but we are surprised by the deepening silence about the matter,” he said in a statement on Tuesday.

“We need to know who is currently heading the government through which constitutional powers,” he demanded.

Citizens Decry Unnecessary Secrecy

Meanwhile Tanzanians demanded they wanted to see their leader in person.

“I believe something is happening but the authorities are hiding,” said Abubakar, a resident of the financial capital Dar es Salaam.

“I will be comfortable if I see the president himself,” he said, noting that there was “unnecessary secrecy”.

“If our beloved president is really ill, they should tell us the truth so that we put him in our prayers,” he added.

Magufuli came to power in 2015 as a no-nonsense, corruption-busting president nicknamed the “Bulldozer”, and was re-elected in a disputed poll last year.

However he has been accused by rights groups and of stifling democracy, and cracking down on the media.

As a result, the country’s journalists have been too afraid to dig into the story, though they had a hint about the truth.

“It’s all about survival and telling the truth. You need to play it safe to continue operating or rush to this delicate story and risk your licence and most importantly your life,” an editor of a privately-owned Swahili newspaper said on condition of anonymity.

The government had also started cracking down on people whom it accuses of spreading the “rumours” that Magufuli was ill through social media, threatening to charge them with cybercrime offences.

So far police had announced the arrest of one person in Dar es Salaam and two in the northern Kilimanjaro region for spreading rumours.

“Rather than give credible evidence that he’s alive and well, they’re arresting innocent people who want to know the truth,” Lissu emphasised.

John Pombe Magufuli’s Profile:

John Pombe Joseph Magufuli was a Tanzanian politician who served as the fifth President of Tanzania from 2015 until his death in 2021.

He served as Minister of Works, Transport and Communications from 2000 to 2005 and 2010 to 2015 and was chairman of the Southern African Development Community from 2019 to 2020.

Magufuli was born on October 29, 1959 in Chato, Tanzania. (He died at 61)

Magufuli had two children, Jessica and Joseph with his wife Janet.

He subscribed to the Chama Cha Mapinduzi Political party.

Education

Chato Primary School, 1967 to 1974

Katoke Seminary – Biharamulo, 1975 to 1977

Lake Secondary School, 1977 to 1978.

Mkwawa High School, 1979 to 1981.

Mkwawa College of Education (a constituent college of the University of Far es Salaam) for a Diploma in Education Science, majoring in Chemistry, Mathematics and Education.

Magufuli earned his bachelor of science in education degree majoring in chemistry and mathematics as teaching subjects from the University of Dar es Salaam in 1988. He also earned his masters and doctorate degrees in chemistry from the University of Dar es Salaam, in 1994 and 2009, respectively.

In late 2019, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Dodoma for improving the economy of the country

By Baron Kironde