DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania (AP) – Samia Suluhu Hassan made history on Friday when she was sworn in as Tanzania’s first female president following the death of her controversial predecessor, John Magufuli, who denied that COVID-19 is a problem in the East. African country.
Hassan, 61, was wearing a hijab and holding up a Koran with her right hand. Hassan, 61, took the oath of office at State House, the government offices in Dar es Salaam, the country’s largest city.
The inauguration was attended by cabinet members, former Presidents Ali Hassan Mwinyi and Jakaya Kikwete. The former heads of state were among the few people in the room who wore face masks for protection against COVID-19.
Hassan succeeds Magufuli, who had not been seen in public for more than two weeks before his death was announced on state television late Wednesday. Magufuli had denied that COVID-19 was a problem in Tanzania, saying that national prayer had eradicated the disease in the country. But Magufuli acknowledged weeks before his death that the virus was a danger.
An important test of Hassan’s new presidency will be how she copes with the pandemic. Under Magufuli, Tanzania, one of Africa’s most populous countries with 60 million people, has made no effort to obtain vaccines or promote the use of masks and social detachment to fight the virus. This policy of ignoring the disease is putting neighboring countries at risk, African health officials warn.
Although Hassan announced that Magufuli died of heart failure, exiled opposition leader Tundu Lissu says the president died of COVID-19, citing informed medical sources in Dar es Salaam.
“The immediate job, the immediate decision she has to make, and she doesn’t have much time for it, is what is she going to do with COVID-19?” Lissu told The Associated Press in exile in Belgium.
“President Magufuli defied the world, defied science, defied common sense in his approach to COVID-19, and it ultimately brought him down,” said Lissu.
“President Samia Saluhu Hassan must decide very quickly whether to change course or continue with the same disastrous approach to COVID-19 as her predecessor,” said the opposition leader.
Hassan also needs to decide how she will address Magufuli’s legacy, including whether to continue with his policies of moving Tanzania from a relatively tolerant democracy to a repressive state, Lissu said, wondering if she will be able to maintain the political freedoms and democracy of to restore the land.
Lissu went into exile in 2017 after being shot 16 times. The attack came shortly after Magufuli said those opposed to his economic reforms deserved death. Lissu returned to Tanzania to challenge Magufuli in the 2020 election. He lost to Magufuli in polls marred by violence and widespread allegations of electoral fraud. Lissu returned to exile and said his life was in danger.
During her inauguration, Hassan gave little indication that she intended to deviate from Magufuli.
“It’s not a good day for me to talk to you because I have a wound in my heart,” Hassan Kiswahili said. “Today I took a different oath than the rest I have taken in my career. Those were taken in luck. Today I took the highest oath of office in mourning, ”she said.
She said that Magufuli, “who always loved to teach,” prepared her for the task at hand. “Nothing will go wrong,” she assured, urging unity.
“This is the time to stand together and make contact. It’s time to bury our differences, show love for each other and look ahead with confidence, ”she said. “It is not the time to point fingers at each other, but to hold hands and move on to build the new Tanzania that President Magufuli aspired to.”
Hassan will finish Magufuli’s second term, which began in October. She has had a rapid rise in politics in a male-dominated field. Both Tanzania and the surrounding East African region are slowly emerging from patriarchy.
After Magufuli chose her as a running mate in 2015, Hassan became Tanzania’s first female vice president. She was the second woman to become Vice President in the region, after Specioza Naigaga Wandira in Uganda, who held office from 1994 to 2003.
Born in Zanzibar, Tanzania’s semi-autonomous archipelago, Hassan attended primary and secondary school in 1960 at a time when very few girls in Tanzania were educated because parents believed a woman to be that of a wife and a housewife.
After graduating from high school in 1977, Hassan studied statistics and went to work for the government, in the Ministry of Planning and Development. She worked for a World Food Program project in Tanzania in 1992 and then went to the University of Manchester in London to earn a postgraduate degree in economics. In 2005, she obtained a Masters in Community Economic Development through a joint program of the Open University of Tanzania and Southern New Hampshire University in the USA.
Hassan entered politics in 2000 when she became a member of the Zanzibar House of Representatives. In 2010 she won the Makunduchi parliamentary seat with more than 80% of the vote. She was appointed cabinet minister in 2014 and became deputy chair of the Constituent Assembly that drafted a new constitution for Tanzania, a role in which she gained respect for deftly dealing with various challenges.
As president, Hassan’s first job will be to unite the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi party behind her, said Ed Hobey-Hamsher, senior Africa analyst at Verisk Maplecroft research firm. The party has been in power since Tanzania’s independence.
As a Muslim woman from Zanzibar, Hassan may find it difficult to gain the support of the party’s mainland Christians, he said, warning that some entrenched leaders may develop “obstructive strategies” against her. He said it is likely that Hassan will begin her rule by maintaining the status quo and not resorting to a major cabinet reshuffle.
Hassan is the second woman in East Africa to serve as head of state. Burundian Sylvia Kiningi was interim president of that small landlocked country for almost four months until February 1994.
Odula contributed from Nakuru, Kenya. AP journalist Bishr Eltouni in Tienen, Belgium contributed.