Tanzania: Revere Magufuli’s Legacy, Lumumba Pleads
A leading pan-Africanist and renowned academic has asked Tanzanians and Africans in general that in celebrating the life of departed President John Magufuli they should question what they have learnt and how to memorialise his legacy.
“Men such as Magufuli upon assuming high office recognised that the office is an opportunity to serve selflessly and do what is good because it was simply good to do good,” Prof Patrick Lumumba said.
“JPM is now with the Lord, and if I am allowed a little sentimentalism, I want to believe that he is on the right side of history. The outpouring of emotion and adulation that was seen in Tanzania was because he lived rare and served rare,” he said.
“… So you and I who are left behind, the question is what will we do to memorialise him?” he probed.
Prof Lumumba stressed that the continent is celebrating the life of a great man because when great men are gathered to their fathers they are not mourned, rather celebrated.
“So we Africans who are gathered here, ours is to celebrate a great man. How are we going to remember this iconic leader? It is by giving prominence to the things that he stood for; in making Africa a great continent so that we are able to recognise that we are not children of a lesser God,” he asserted.
Having had the opportunity to walk the streets of various regions in the country, Prof Lumumba said that in five years it is evident on what a man can do through an administration when he or she makes the decision to serve his country.
“I have had the advantage of having lengthy conversations with the late President Magufuli, and I can say as a fact that there are few Africans in the positions that he held who had an idea of how to liberate this continent from the yolk of neo-colonialism,” he stated.
“… If there was ever a Tanzanian Head of State in which the spirit of Mwalimu Julius Nyerere found residence, it was in the late John Pombe Joseph Magufuli,” Prof Lumumba explained.
He said that his humility, selflessness, Tanzanianness, Africaness, and consciousness that the continent has people who deserve the best. The writers were right; those whom God loves, He takes soon, he pointed out.
He further stated that, “conspiracy theorists are now populating the social media with conspiracy after conspiracy. I refuse to swim in that sea because it is populated with crocodiles and hippopotami who I do not want to resettle with. I choose to walk on the firm ground that Dr Magufuli built when he lived on this earth.”
Concerning the African traditions, he pointed out that once one is sick or dead it is customary that even the enemies become friends. But, for those who do not know this are to be forgiven as they do not know what they are doing.
Prof Lumumba concluded that the late Magufuli will be remembered by historians, as a man who served his country in truth and dedication.
“Great men such as him are not to be mourned, they are to be celebrated; hence the statement, Magufuli is dead, long live JPM,” he gloomily reiterated.
The late President Magufuli was heroically laid to rest in his home village in Chato District, Geita Region yesterday, after political and religious leaders paid glowing tribute to the iconic statesman.
Magufuli died on Wednesday, March 17 of ‘heart condition’ known as chronic atrial fibrillation at the age of 61. His sudden demise left the country grief-stricken as 21-day national mourning was declared.
by Daily News.
