Cleopa Msuya Biography: His Legacy And Controversies.

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Cleopa Msuya, a former prime minister and first vice president of Tanzania, is now deceased following cardiac complications. He had lost a battle after a long illness. Msuya was a political titan on our political stage, most fondly remembered during the first administration under Julius Nyerere and later his successor, Ali Hassan Mwinyi. He was a dedicated public servant who made his mark on the national building. This article chronicles his life and times of public service, revisiting his legacy and controversies that many writers would not touch even with an electric pole.

Early Life and Education.

 Cleopa David Msuya was born on 4 January 1931 in Chomvu Usangi, Mwanga District, Kilimanjaro Region, Tanzania. He pursued higher education at Makerere University in Uganda from 1952 to 1955, laying the foundation for his future career in public service.

Political Career.

Msuya’s career in governance began in rural community development, eventually ascending to key roles in Tanzania’s government:

Civil Service:

Between 1964 and 1972, he served as Permanent Secretary in ministries such as Community Development, Lands and Water Development, Economic Affairs and Planning, and Finance.

Ministerial Roles:

He became Minister of Finance in 1972 and later Minister of Industry, demonstrating expertise in economic policy.

Prime Minister: 

First Term:

7 November 1980 – 24 February 1983.

Second Term:

7 December 1994 – 28 November 1995, concurrently serving as First Vice President.

Post-Retirement:

After retiring from active politics in 2000, he remained influential in Tanzania’s ruling party, CCM, and chaired the Kilimanjaro Development Forum. On 23 October 2019, Cleopa Msuya, at the age of 88, was appointed Chancellor of the Ardhi Institute by the President John Magufuli.

Illness and Death.

Msuya passed away on 7 May 2025 at Mzena Hospital in Dar es Salaam, aged 94, after battling prolonged cardiac complications. Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan declared seven days of national mourning, with flags flown at half-mast until 13 May 2025.

Legacy.

Msuya’s contributions spanned economic planning, fiscal management, and national development. His dual tenure as Prime Minister and leadership in finance ministries solidified his role as a key architect of Tanzania’s post-independence policies.

His involvement in the restructuring of the cooperative movement was perhaps his enduring legacy. At that time, the cooperative movement was perceived as very corrupt, and government interventions made it worse.

First president Julius Nyerere later acknowledged after retirement the reforms didn’t address the core issues of corruption but made them worse. The bureaucrats who were introduced didn’t have ownership connections as a result they ran the cooperatives down.

While Msuya was considered a right hand man of Mwalimu Julius Nyerere during his rule together with Amir H. Jamal, there were lingering doubts about whether they believed in Nyerere’s egalitarian vision.

There were times media casted Nyerere as a long ranger not having genuine support among his cabinet. Unlike Oscar Kambona who fell out with Nyerere over Nyerere’s socialist policies and suppression of multiparty democracy, Msuya was a one party political system advocate who reluctantly embraced multiparty democracy with one precondition: CCM political dominance remained unchallenged, no matter what! His legacy still reverberates today as CCM bludgeons  Chadema, the most popular political party in – the post-Nyerere era.

In 1995, he attempted to succeed President Ali Hassan Mwinyi as the second premier to do so after Nyerere. He was able to be shortlisted in the five CCM presidential applicants. He was also among the three candidates who were sent to the CCM general convention but came last after Benjamin Mkapa and Jakaya Kikwete, respectively. Mkapa bagged the CCM presidential nomination and proceeded to lead Tanzania for ten years.

In his concession speech, Msuya appeared bitter and inconsolable. Some of those who attended the CCM convention perceived him as nursing a grudge after losing the presidential nominations. Unlike Kikwete who seemingly accepted his fate, Msuya was seen sulking, pensive and shaking his head in disbelief. Kikwete was later appointed in Mkapa’s cabinet as a foreign minister, a position he held for a decade. He went on to become the president also for a decade.

Msuya’s political career came to an end, since he had become a prime minister he couldn’t continue in the government. The new successive leaderships came up with their own people whom they trusted. That is understandable since nobody wants to have anything to do with their former boss in their governments. Any position short of the presidency was a demotion to Msuya who had already ascended to become the prime minister.

Msuya led a quiet life during retirement until he was appointed TBL chairperson, a position he occupied till his demise. During his earlier stint at TBL, the company grew in bounds and leaps, with those holding TBL shares reaping sizable dividends. Much later, Msuya was heard complaining about reduced volumes of alcohol consumption in Tanzania. TBL had hit its ceiling and was dropping down.

Whether it was reduced alcohol consumption, battered living standards, the costs of liquor themselves or competition from other brewers that negatively impacted TBL’s annual revenues is a subject for another day. However, some questioned whether Msuya was the right person to head TBL.  His political career was seen as unsuitable for a business undertaking. By the time of his death, TBL had failed to issue dividends to its shareholders in the last four years, indicating tough times have paid a visit to the company.

This is ironic since other private companies, such as CRDB, are doing much better. The comparison may be unfair since the two pursue different types of business. However, a bigger discussion on the relevance of privatisation of Tanzania’s profit-making companies persists. During May Day in 1990, Nyerere had cautioned about privatising Tanzanian companies that were making a profit. His counsel went unheeded. The whole exercise was marred by official graft, and wisdom was pinched. It is important to put the record straight: Msuya had nothing to do with it.

Now 35 years later we still wonder what benefit as a nation we got from privatisation of TBL, TCC and NBC. What is glaring to the eye is stagnation, loss of senior managerial to Tanzanians, technological advancement and repatriation of profits amd taxes abroad. But who really were the beneficiaries of privatisation remains a thorny subject deluged with blame games.

In one of his last interviews, Msuya was queried by a reporter what he thought of opposition in Tanzania. He replied CCM had a long catch up to do, since opposition qas winning the policy debate.

During the draconian rule of Magufuli, he was also asked to share his views this is what he said:

“…baba akiongea sisi kazi yetu ni kufuata tu…”

He overlooked Magufuli’s excesses and it dilates why Magufuli didn’t remove him from the TBL chairperson but added Ardhi University Chancellorship irrespective of Msuya being an octogenarian!

Magufuli loved to generously reward his supporters, and Msuya knew what he was doing.

His controversies.

Msuya during his premier stint will be remembered for pulling national resources for his Mwanga constituency. It was a rampant abuse of public office but many praised him for bringing development to his voters. Every time I was plying in night buses we used to see Mwanga full of lights, and the constituency was elevated to a district. Through this he became unbeatable in Mwanga constituency.

His controversy over this was to embolden future national leaders to also place the development of their constituencies above national interests. It narrates the manifestation of regions and districts adding up to unnecessary operational costs. During Mkapa presidency (1995-2005), his prime Minister Frederick Sumaye was instrumental in dividing Arusha into two regions of Manyara and Arusha proper.

Sumaye’s reasoning was the Waarusha who were livestock keepers were marginalizing the Mbulu who were land cultivators. Sumaye parlayed tribal grounds to appease his political base in Mbulu, Babati and Karatu. This was Msuya’s controversial legacy.

Likewise Sumaye’s successor Peter Mizengo Pinda as premier during Kikwete administration repeated the same and established Katavi region with its national park to boot.

Former first female House Speaker Anne Semamba Makinda (2010 – 2015) had her own region carved out of the Iringa region. Her excuse was the region development fund was being distributed equally, so the more the regions, the better off the people in those areas! She toyed with the name of her new parcelled region from Njowepo before settling to Njombe.

President Magufuli did the same for his constituency in Chato, where CRDB constructed a branch irrespective of market demands. Later the then chief executive officer of CRDB conceded the Chato Branch was not in the CRDB corporate plans but was a political pressure.

Magufuli constructed an airport, tarmac roads and other infrastructure, which, after his death, have become underutilised. There were talks of creating 32 regions for a country that had only 4 during independence. The administrative cost of all these 31 regions has not been done, but a number of people have been cited to justify the proliferation of those regions. A country with a vast area like the US jas only 50 states nit never complains about the size or population as valid variables to multiply more states. Only banana republics care less about the economics of running a poor nation that cannot afford free healthcare and tertiary education.

When critics questioned why President Magufuli was pulling national resources to his constituency, his diehards cited Msuya’s case. And this is what they loved to shade the critics:

“… wakati wa Msuya mbona mlikuwa mnamsifia alipokuwa akiwapelekea maendeleo wapigakura wake?”

 We were speechless!

A school teacher tested Msuya’s forbearance in the Mwanga constituency election.

 One teacher, however, attempted to unseat Msuya at Mwanga during one-party state. Rumours had that Msuya had tried to bribe the teacher not to disturb Mheshimiwa to no avail. The teacher was lured with a scholarship to study abroad but the teacher wouldn’t budge. Msuya wanted to win the constituency unchallenged, an important milestone establishing his likeability and popularity factors. It wasn’t about winning because the winner was known even before one vote was cast but this teacher deprived him of an aura of invincibility which Msuya craved for.

Many blamed the teacher’s intransigence but the teacher wanted to make a valid point: Tanzania is ours too notwithstanding our social standing. The teacher lost the election and the alleged overseas scholarship, as well. The issue of who really own Tanzania is still contentious even today between the rulers and their subjects.

The wrangling of the division of KKKT diocese in his backyard stirred a grudge and a revenge.

Msuya got himself entangled in the division of KKKT in his Mwanga District. Whatever had transpired he seemed to run afoul with the KKKT secretary general whom he forced to resign. This secretary general attempted to run as CCM MP. His name was chopped during CCM nominations despite winning a popular vote in his constituency, many suspect Msuya had something to do with it. However, the then president Mkapa appointed this former KKKT secretary general to be a DC. Those who crossed Msuya lived to regret it later.

Msuya and Kawawa names were adversely mentioned in the fatal accident of the then prime minister Edward Moringe Sokoine in 1984.

Msuya together with Rashid Mfaume Kawawa were adversely mentioned to be involved in the accident of the then prime minister Edward Moringe Sokoine. Sokoine was overzealous in wiping out the “contraband economy” in our country, and many thought he was Nyerere’s natural successor. If you had listened to the rumour mongers in 1984 after Sokoine had died in a road accident the vivid accusations appeared plausible.

Nyerere’s speech announcing the death of Sokoine didn’t quell the wild rumours. Some even went as far as quoting the then Muhimbili professor James Shaba as their eyewitness. They said he had eavesdropped to his drinking pals in a bar somewhere in Dar-es-Salaam when all were tipsy that during postmortem he had stumbled on a bullet in the abdomen of Sokoine. Professor Shaba never denounced those rumours. After he had retired, Professor Shaba had perspired to secure his terminal benefits until he called the media to expose his ordeal. He got paid after six months of delays after delays.

Rumour mongers had a field day that Shaba was being punished for revealing government secrets. According to his family, Professor Shaba died peacefully in his home on December 5, 2023 in Chicago Illinois.  He neither

affirmed bor renounced those rumours. The rumours persisted that Sokoine was a victim of foul play orchestrated by senior members of CCM apprehensive of his then forthcoming presidential rule.

The nature of Sokoine fatal accident remains controversial.

Was it a freak accident or a man-made one? The reckless South Africa driver who crashed his pickup on the side of the prime minister, Sokoine’s Mercedes Benz got out with a light sentence of three years coupled with a deportation. It was ruled manslaughter. The Mercedes Benz is a toughie shouldn’t lead to any fatalities.

 Besides, only Sokoine died while the rest of his team in his car and a driver survived with minor injuries! Sokoine was blamed for not buckling up a seat belt. There were no independent verifications. With such revelations it is difficult to dismiss the compelling claims of foul play albeit the perpetrators remain unknown, and possibly at large!

Nobody has ever asked either Kawawa or Msuya during their lifetimes to respond to the rumours. Henceforth, the rumours remain unresolved. Books on Sokoine have not addressed this issue which remain politically sensitive even to mention in Tanzania! Most biographies of Tanzanian politicians tend to be hagiographies. It is heaping praise to the deceased depriving readers with lessons to tap in.

Government owned Daily News shrieked Msuya: an astute politician and former prime minister John Malecela in his TBC contribution after the death of Msuya concurred that he was a brilliant politician of his generation! Maybe he was, but I often struggle to reconcile with this kind of unmerited encomium when dealing with a very poor nation. My question is what was his contribution to end poverty in Tanzania? How can anybody be brilliant if his impact on his people is not substantial to alleviate massive poverty?

I believe the debate on Msuya’s contribution to Tanzania has just begun in earnest and will continue to be interrogated in the years to come. This is my tepid contribution to provoke a thoughtful assessment of his legacy and controversies.

Read more analysis by Rutashubanyuma Nestory