FM: Mbona hilo la kuwaenzi mashujaa wetu nimelisema? Ahsante sana kwa picha. Nilkwenda nyumbani kwa Mzee Japhet Kirilo IUsa River wakati nafanya utafiti tena alonipeleka alikuwa Abduwahid Ally Sykes hatukumkuta alikuwa kenda Nairobi.
Aaaaah mkuu wangu kwa kufunga kamba wewe hata huwezekani. Nimekusoma na nashindwa kukuelewa kabisaaaa. Hivi wewe una umri gani haswa maana hapo chini nasoma ukidai kwamba aliyekupeka kumwona mzee Japhet alikuwa AbdulWahid Sykes (ati wakati ukifanya utafiti) ambaye sisi sote tunajua alikufa mwaka 1968 sasa hii habari inakuwaje?..
Haya Ebu nambie habari hiii pia:- Je unaikubali kama ilivyoandikwa?
On October 10, 1953, there was a T.A.A. meeting in the little house with the beautifully carved Arab door which Sir Donald Cameron had built in New Street. Because T.A.A. was very low in funds, one of its rooms had been rented to an Asian, who was running a laundry. The other was the T.A.A. office.
In the small airless room Julius Nyerere sat on one chair at a decrepit desk, John Rupia on another chair, the Sykes brothers and Dossa Aziza perched on packing cases. Nyerere opened the meeting by saying that he had given much thought to T.A.A., but he could not transform it into a political organization. His friends were thrilled, as this meant that T.A.A. was finished and that they would now form a real political party.
There were many suggestions as to what to call it. Abdul Sykes remembered that while waiting for repatriation at kalian camp outside Bombay, they had discussed political organization and tried all sorts of names, of which he liked Tanganyika African Union best. To Nyerere this sounded too much like Kenya African Union, and he thought that something, for instance ‘national', should be added, calling it Tanganyika National African Union.
Ally Sykes remarked that the initials of Tanganyika National African union T.N.A.U., were A tongue-twister; but if the name were rearranged to Tanganyika African National Union, T.A.N.U. would be easy to say. ‘T.A.N.U.'-they all repeated the four initials which were to become famous in African history. ‘T.A.N.U.' Thus was the Tanganyika African National Union born.
Nyerere modeled it's constitution on that of Nkrumah's Convention Peoples' Party; the basic structure and much of the actual phrasing was taken over
. Tanu was ‘to fight relentlessly until Tanganyika is self-governing and independent', ‘to build up a united nationalism'; it was to fight for ‘elections for all bodies of local and central government ….to have African majorities'; for small industries, training schools artisans, fair prices for consumers and producers, minimum wage and compulsory primary education. Tanu was to fight against ‘tribalism and all isolationist tendencies amongst Africans….Against racialism and racial discrimination and federation until the demand ‘comes from the African inhabitants of these territories.'
Membership was to be open to Africans only, from the age of 18 ; trade unions and tribal associations could affiliate provided they charged their members a political levy which would be paid to Tanu. If Tanu was to become a political party, it had to have mass support. Already in 1948 T.A.A. had 39 branches, with 1,780 members. The chances were that all would join Tanu. But without money, without a publication, without means to advertise, it seemed hopeless to build these few hundred educated Africans into a popular following.
Then came an incident which convinced the nationalists more than ever that they had to organize themselves. In Lusaka, Harry Nkumubla's National Congress Party sponsored a Pan-African Congress, to which for the first time British, American and Far Eastern friends were also invited. It was a matter of prestige that, when the slogan was: ‘Yours is the national struggle for freedom ….' T.A.A., Bokhe Munanka, collected a sum sufficient for his own expenses. As the British authorities would not grant Munanka a passport, in the end Ally Sykes and Denis Phombeah became Tanganyika delegates. Ally was one of the three Sykes brothers, who had served during the war in the K.A.R.; he had then found employment in a dance band in Nairobi.
In 1948 he returned to Dar-es-salaam to become a civil servant; by 1952 he was running the Dar-es-salaam employment agency, a Government concern; he was also secretary-General of T.A.G.S.A., the Tanganyika African Government Servants Association. Denis Phombeah was in the happy position of owning a motor bicycle, the only means of transport the young nationalists had.
Ally Sykes induced T.A.G.S.A to pay for the two air tickets to Lusaka; from the funds left over from kirillo Japheth's trip to New York, they paid in advance for hotel accommodation in Salisbury, where they had to change aircraft and spend the night, and for their stay in Lusaka. Nothing was left to chance-or so they thought …
Ningependa sana kuiweka yote hapa ili tuijadili kama utapenda na utaona tofauti ya Uandishi baina yake na huyu njemba alokuwa wakili wa TANU..
