Warioba: Mwinyi’s vision led to economic recovery

DAR ES SALAAM: THE former Prime Minister, retired Judge Joseph Warioba has described the late ex-President, Mr Ali Hassan Mwinyi, 98 as the visionary and resilient leader, who assumed office when country was encountered with socioeconomic hardship turning the situation to normal.

While paying last respects to the body of Mzee Mr Mwinyi at the national funeral service held at the Uhuru Stadium in Dar es Salaam, yesterday, he noted during his first three years in presidency, he led the country from the persisted difficulties including oil and food shortage to prosperity.

Retired Judge Warioba, who served concurrently as the premier and Vice-president during the second phase government attributed, Mr Mwinyi’s triumph to patriotism, accountability and participatory leadership.

“He formed a special task force which I was part of, to address the economic difficulties with the task force, we worked day and night for three years to the point that the fuel price returned to normalcy,” he pointed out.

Adding that “goods also flourished in the shops as the result of trade liberalisation while farmers intensified production to attain surplus.” The former premier said the social and political challenges included the post effects of the collapse of the East Africa Community (EAC), Uganda War and the fuel price hike which slowed social and economic development.

Furthermore, he said the nation experienced scarcity of goods in shops and food shortage all combined under inadequate resource for addressing them.

Hence, he urged leaders and citizens to emulate Mr Mwinyi’s unwavering resiliency insisting that even the ongoing setbacks such as sugar shortage are minor. In another development, he said Mr Mwinyi was the visionary unifying leader, who maintained a low profile before and after his presidency.

Judge Warioba mentioned silence, humbleness and integrity as the main characters that made him win approval from citizens and his ruling party CCM both in Zanzibar and Tanzania Mainland. From 1945 to 1964 the late Mzee Mwinyi worked successively as a tutor, teacher, and head teacher at various schools before deciding to enter national politics.

He noted that Mr Mwinyi, who served various top positions in Zanzibar in 1960s and later in at the Union government from 1970s, never capitalised on his position to enrich himself.

“Before his journey to presidency in Zanzibar, Mr Mwinyi was not popular due to his well reserved nature of humbleness and calmness. He also desisted intraparty group that would bring division,” he said.

Equally, Judge Warioba narrated that it was until in 1984 when Mr Mwinyi went popular after political turbulent in Zanzibar due to the resignation of the then President of Zanzibar, Mr Aboud Jumbe, that pressurised CCM to look for a successor, who could unite Zanzibaris. He said Mwinyi’s characters won majority endorsement within the party’s Central Committee (CC) for him to lead Zanzibar whereby he restored the political stability as it was envisioned.

The late President was later on nominated and ascended as Tanzania Mainland President from 1985 to 1995 whereby he continued to unite the entire country through among others reintroduction of multipartism.

Overall, he described Mr Mwinyi as the team player, patriotic, accountable and selfless leader, who placed the interest of the country ahead of everything else. He called upon all citizens to extend their prayers to the Mr Mwinyi while celebrating his life time which was a gift to the country.

Mr Mwinyi passed away aged 98 on Thursday evening, while undergoing treatment for lung cancer at the Mzena Hospital in Dar es Salaam.