Articles of Union made public

THE State House on Monday acknowledged the presence of the Articles of the Union and vowed to bring it to the Constituent Assembly (CA) as proof.

A statement issued by the Directorate of Presidential Communications in Dar es Salaam said that apart from bringing the document to the assembly based on a special request, the government will also arrange for the same to be put in the National Museum for the public to see.

The statement was released shortly after the Chief Secretary, Ambassador Ombeni Sefue, had met the press over the matter. For quite some time, some CA members have used the absence of the Articles of the Union to question the legitimacy of the Union.

“It is so sad that today, more than 50 years since we united as one republic, some people are coming with arguments that the Union is illegitimate simply because there is no Articles of the Union,” read the statement, adding:

“If the CA Chairman asks for this document to be brought before the Assembly, I am sure President Jakaya Kikwete will be willing so that this chapter can now be closed once and for all.”

According to the statement, “the document will be displayed at the National Museum to enable the people of this generation as well as the future generation in the next 50 years to see it.”

The statement added: “It is absurd that there are people who still question the act by the two founder fathers of the Union to sign the Articles of the Union on April 22, 1964, in addition to insinuating that the two had cheated simply because the document was nowhere to be easily seen.”

It admitted, however, that it is true there are very sensitive national documents that stand as symbols of the country’s sovereignty, free republic and free union that must be confidentially stored and thus not easily reached.

“Such documents are Articles of the Tanganyika of 1961, Articles of the Tanganyikan Republic of 1962 and the Articles of the Union of 1964.

These documents are well safeguarded in a very safe place,” it reads further. “But due to the current situation, whereby a number of allegations keep on coming from all corners on the legitimacy of the articles, it is prudent that they are now brought openly for public scrutiny,” the statement pointed out.

The original documents, which were signed by the Union’s founders, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere and his Zanzibar counterpart, Mzee Abeid Amani Karume, were also displayed to the media at a press conference yesterday. But according to the State House statement, President Kikwete was approached and in principle agreed for the documents to be made public.

“This document has been there ever since. It has been well kept by leaders in all phases of the nation’s administration. It has been inherited by the all past phases and will be kept in safe custody forever,” the State House maintained.

Allegations on the legality of the Articles of the Unions have created unnecessary tension, in addition to the dismay of many Tanzanians who have over the years cherished the Union as a model for unity in Africa.

The State House statement appealed to the people to now direct their attention to other important nation building issues and avoid apportioning blame on the Union’s founders “over the Articles that are after all there for everybody to see.”

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