It is a little over a year ago that Ambassador Juma Volter Mwapachu was laid to rest in Pande Village, Tanga Region. On Sunday April 19, a jovial remembrance event was held for the man simply known as JV to many. It is no child’s play to do justice to JV’s illustrious life, as I had stated upon his death.
In his introductory remarks during the remembrance evening, a former law professor at the University of Dar es Salaam, Chris Peter Maina, laid out the entire gamut of JV’s writings.
It is my deeply considered view that after Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, no one else matched him on the subject of writing on issues critically focused on development questions for Tanzania. A public intellectual par excellence was JV.
Indeed, it was the ex-president of the African Development Bank, Donald Kaberuka, who made reference to JV as a “development specialist”. A fellow ambassador and one whom JV would defer to as his senior, Ami Mpungwe, put it aptly in Ambassador Mwapachu’s book:
“It would mostly take institutional memory to match JV’s vast networks of personalities and varied issues that he has encountered in his life’s journey, all in search for meaningful development pathways for Tanzania, Africa and the world in general...”
Such was JV’s lived experience of Tanzania’s rural and urban settings and changing landscape.
Tanzania irrefutably stands to gain immeasurably from much of his thinking, as well as equally inspiring public officials to also put their pens to paper.
In keeping with the latter point, I am making this heartfelt appeal to Tanzania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where Ambassador JV Mwapachu had served in various capacities from India to Ethiopia to France, before his final posting in Arusha as Secretary General (SG) of the East African Community (EAC).
It was incidentally while at the EAC that he was conferred a doctorate of political science by the National University of Rwanda.
And a year before that, during Kenya's 48th Independence Day celebrations on December 12, 2011, he was decorated by President Mwai Kibaki with the Republic of Kenya’s highest national award, the Moran of the Order of the Golden Heart (MGH) for his outstanding service as SG of the EAC (2006-2011) in advancing regional integration.
We may note that, besides JV, no other Tanzanians have been publicly documented as recipients of Kenyan national honours.
My appeal to the ministry is to consider honouring Ambassador Mwapachu with an “Award for Outstanding Writing”.
I mean here is a man who established a magazine in 1993 by the name Change.
It lasted piteously only five years. In JV’s words, “it was aimed to inspire professional and intellectual Tanzanians and others to address some of the burning issues facing our country and the region.”
As managing editor, JV made a personal contribution of no less than 37 articles.
Change magazine was even subscribed to by some educational institutions from overseas. Tanzanians deserve to be proud of that history.
Other than Change, Ambassador Mwapachu authored on his own four books and co-authored three others.
He had five chapters in published books, 14 articles in peer-reviewed academic journals, three book reviews, 64 publications in a local newspaper called
The African, three publications in the Daily News newspaper as well as eight publications in The Citizen daily newspaper.
It is unbelievable stuff to get round the head! JV even has a chapter, from 20 years ago, on how to brand Tanzania for those involved in tourism promotion.
He never left anything out. One can’t say more other than to humbly request the ministry that is the image of the country to honour this dedicated son of Tanzania through his incredible writings.
Andrew Bomani is a political writer and a co-founder of Tanzania’s yet-to-be-registered Independent People’s Party
