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Derek R Peterson

12 Aug, 11 tweets, 6 min read

The Tanzania govt's campaign against the opposition brings to mind an earlier episode: the Treason Trial of 1970-71.

Prosecutors claimed that Oscar Kambona--shown here in London--masterminded a plot to assassinate Nyerere & others. A key co-defendant: Bibi Titi Mohammed. Thread.

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Purportedly Kambona sent Bibi Titi funds to pay an assassin, who would work with men in the military to bring down Nyerere's govt.

The trial opened in Dar in May 1970. The Kenya Daily Nation had a reporter in the courtroom for the whole trial, which lasted more than a year.

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A key witness for the prosecution was Potlako Leballo, sometime leader of the Pan-African Congress, a South Africa-based anti-apartheid organization headquartered in Dar.

Leballo acted as a spy for TZ intelligence, as these reports show.

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The trial itself was very much a public occasion. Kambona (who was tried in absentia) had been Minister of External Affairs in Nyerere's cabinet; Bibi Titi Mohammed, his co-conspirator, had been head of Umoja ya Wanawake wa Tanzania

Here's a clip from the trial's opening day.

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Key to the plot was--apparently--Bibi Titi. She was the heroine of Tanzanian nationalism, a key figure in the early history of TANU, and a mentor to Nyerere. Her role in the plot was the subject of several days' discussion in the trial--as reported below.

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The court's ruling--upheld on appeal--was to convict Bibi Titi & others, and to acquit three of the defendants. Here's the Nation report.

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Bibi Titi was held in prison for several years--then pardoned and released.

She had planned to write her autobiography, as reported here. In the 1980s though she began to work with the young historian Susan Geiger, who did foundational life history work with her.

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Bibi Titi Mohammed's biography was published under the title _TANU Women_ (1997). I was Susan Geiger's student in those days. I remember her as a fiercely thoughtful scholar.

Bibi Titi Mohammed passed away in 2000, living in exile in S. Africa.
amazon.com/TANU-Women-Tan…

@Udadisi

9/
Corrections to the thread above, helpfully prompted by @Udadisi & others.

1. Bibi Titi maintained until she died that she had no part in a plot to oust Nyerere. She told Geiger & others that she was part of a movement for constitutional change in TZ--but there was no plot.

@Udadisi

@Udadisi 10/
Further corrections:
2. Bibi Titi was freed in February 1972, after about a year in prison.

3. She died in South Africa--but not in exile. She lived a low-profile life in TZ after her release. In the mid-1980s she was 'rehabilitated' & appeared alongside Nyerere in public.

@Udadisi

@Udadisi 11/
There's surprisingly little scholarly work on the Treason Trial. @jamesrbrennantz is working on a really important biography of Kambona; and @g_m_roberts has a forthcoming book about the intelligence business in Dar.

I'd be glad to know of others!

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Derek R Peterson

@Unseen_Archive

29 Jun

Swazi king Mswati III today fled the country in the face of popular anger.

Here's a thread on the history of protest in eSwatini. In 1963 striking miners & sugar workers demanded better wages & an open political system. The strike was put down by British troops flown frm Kenya.

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The strike leaders were identified by hooded 'screeners'--a technique borrowed from the British campaign against Mau Mau in Kenya.

Below: British troops round up striking workers at an asbestos mine in eSwatini, June 1963. They were demanding one man-one vote.

3/
In 1964 voters went to the polls for the first time in 61 years of British colonial control. The king--Sobhuza II--launched a political party to contest the election. He intended to take Swaziland into apartheid South Africa--a means of reinforcing his royal power.

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Derek R Peterson

@Unseen_Archive

23 Jun

@RuhakanaR

Today @RuhakanaR--Uganda's PM--handed over his office.

Dr. Rugunda has been a constant presence in public life. He first appears in the archival record in 1969, when--as VP of the Nat Union of Students @Makerere--he visited the US ambassador.

Here's the diplomat's report. 1/

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Rugunda was a high school student, about to enter university. The subjects of their discussion: the US's dismal treatment of black Americans & the ongoing war in Vietnam.

Two weeks later Rugunda was back at the US embassy with further criticism of the US war in Vietnam.

@UCBerkeley

3/
After Idi Amin came to power many NUSU leaders went into exile. Rugunda went to @UCBerkeley, where he did an MA in Public Health. Photo below from 1978.

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Derek R Peterson

@Unseen_Archive

22 Jun

@Reuters

In 1968 the Tanzanian Youth League launched Operation Vijana. Their target: women who wore miniskirts. Wigs, dyed hair & tight bellbottoms were also abolished. Here's a @Reuters clip from Dar es Salaam.

'It is foolish to wear clothes that show legs,' Nyerere declared. 1/3

Here's a TYL poster from 1968 illustrating 'appropriate' styles of attire.

For several months TYL 'Green Guards' roamed the city's streets, defrocking women found wearing clothing they deemed inappropriate. Also abolished: soul music from the United States.

@UdsmOfficial

3/3
By 1970 the campaign had largely run out of steam. Female students @UdsmOfficial organised marches defending miniskirts, routing the TYL with a chant of 'Get lost'. Girls at a youth hostel unanimously voted that 'men should not decide what women will wear'.

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Derek R Peterson

@Unseen_Archive

29 May

At 3 am on 1 Aug 1982 soldiers from the Kenya Air Force launched a coup against the gov't of Daniel arap Moi.

The airmen seized Eastleigh airbase & the Voice of Kenya in Nairobi. They called themselves the National Redemption Council.

Clip below from the morning after. 1/4

2/4
In an announcement--read by VoK's Leonard Mambo--they accused Moi of carrying out 'ruthless repression reminiscent of colonial days ... Moi's bandit gang is gone. People can now breathe'.

There was a great deal of looting in the CBD. Here's the cleanup the morning after.

3/4
Moi was in Kabarnet at the time of the coup, & much of the army leadership was in Lodwar.

A small group of officers stormed the VoK, & then the army fanned out in Nairobi, searching for Air Force men. At least 3,000 people were arrested; 100 soldiers were killed.

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Derek R Peterson

@Unseen_Archive

21 Jan

Today, 20 Jan., is the anniversary of the assassination (in 1973) of Amilcar Cabral.

Cabral was the key figure in the independence struggle of Guinea-Bissau & one of the great theorists of African politics.

Below: youth in Dar es Salaam protest Cabral's assassination. 1/

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Cabral led the Partido Africano da Independência da Guiné e Cabo Verde. The party went to war against the Portuguese in 1956.

Here's Cabral in Dakar, May 1969. By then the PAIGC had freed 2/3 of the country. Cabral introduced civilians who'd been injured by Portuguese bombs.

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Cabral's PAIGC established schools in liberated zones & provided free education. They offered health care with the help of Cuban doctors; and PAIGC soldiers gave peasants training in agriculture, too.

Below: PAIGC school near Conakry, May 1971.

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Derek R Peterson

@Unseen_Archive

20 Jan

The TAZARA railway was built btwn 1970 and 1975. It was to connect Zambia's copper mines to the port at Dar es Salaam.

The funds--over $400 million--came from Mao's China. It was China's largest aid project to date.

Here's Nyerere & Kaunda at the groundbreaking, Oct. 1970. 1/

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Nyerere & Kaunda hoped the railway wld help create economies freed from the control of the racist regimes of S Africa & Rhodesia.

By Aug. 1973 50,000 workers had laid 600 miles of track. Here's the ceremony when the workers reached Tunduma, at the border between TZ & Zambia.

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Here's Nyerere in 1970 defending his government's willingness to work with China.

When the skeptical interviewer asked about Mao--who had said that Africa was 'ripe for revolution'--Nyerere replied that 'I, too, say Africa is ripe for revolution'.