“It was completed on time because no-one used corona as an excuse to delay it,” John Magufuli, the Tanzanian president who died this week said, a few weeks ago, as he commissioned a road project in Dar es Salaam. The Bulldozer as he was called never locked down his nation even at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic. He died of “heart problems” but many do assume that he fell to coronavirus.
He fought corruption and got projects delivered on time. His hands-on leadership style was legendary because he verified even as he believed. He was the people’s man, and he fought for his nation.
But Magufuli never worked to build institutions. He simply built himself. He decimated the core foundations of modern society where even the Tanzanian scientists, press and doctors could not overcome his covid-free mantra. By testing goat meats and using the data to justify the denial of the virus, he risked many lives.
Register for Tekedia Mini-MBA edition 18 (Sep 15 – Dec 6, 2025) today for early bird discounts. Do annual for access to Blucera.com.
Tekedia AI in Business Masterclass opens registrations.
Join Tekedia Capital Syndicate and co-invest in great global startups.
Register for Tekedia AI Lab: From Technical Design to Deployment.
A strong man, for many, who fought the global mining companies, he left Tanzania where he found it: absence of institutions. In his ephemeral success, he exposed his biggest failures: absence of a national vision beyond Magufuli’s vision.
Magufuli was 61.
---
Register for Tekedia Mini-MBA (Sep 15 – Dec 6, 2025), and join Prof Ndubuisi Ekekwe and our global faculty; click here.
He left legacies of a great value system!
He was demonized for being boldly assertive against those who plunder us.
When a man denies SCIENCE, he kills on the way. When doctors and press cannot openly write that a disease kills because a president says it does not, you have no nation.