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1 Chapter one My Life in Summary In the lounge of the house in which we presently live, there is a painting hanging on the wall by the artist John E. Lyimo. It is that of a Chagga traditional grass-thatched hut, conical in shape, with the goats’ pen outside. Two Chagga ladies are outside, one seated on a log of firewood and the other standing near the entrance to the hut. This is a typical hut as it looked at the time I was growing up and going to primary school. At that time I actually lived in such a house and after returning from school in the afternoon, I used to take the goats to the grazing grounds or went to fetch feed for them if the grazing grounds happened to be unavailable. This was the case if they were planted with a crop such as maize, finger-millet or beans. In our family we call this painting Tumetoka Mbali, meaning ‘We have come from afar’, and our children and grandchildren entirely agree. Our grandchildren who have only seen this type of hut at the Village Museum in Dar es Salaam, marvel at the fact that I lived in such a house; and they always pester me to show them the exact location of their great grandmother’s house whenever we visit Marangu. Additionally, there is another painting hanging on the wall in my study. This is by the famous East African artist, Elimo P. Njau. It is the scene of a few goats being herded by a boy who is actually hidden behind a huge shady tree. When Elimo Njau visited my home one day and discovered that I had bought his painting from one of his exhibitions, he was quite excited. I took the opportunity of his visit to discuss some features of the painting with him. During this discussion I asked Elimo why he had not put the goatherd fully in the scene, and he explained that he would have had to show the true likeness of a person who was not, in any case, important in the painting. He said the boy could be himself or even Edwin Mtei, for that matter. I agreed with him for we were neighbours when we were growing up in 2 Marangu, and he and I used to take our respective family goats to graze. Elimo Njau now lives in Kenya. One of the friends, who suggested that I should write this story, Dr. Anthony Bulengo, saw both these paintings. When I explained to him how dear they were to me as reflecting on my early life, he remarked: ‘Why don’t you write your story and call it “From Goatherd to Governor “or simply “From G To G”. At the time this exchange took place, about early 1975, I had just completed my service as Governor of the Bank of Tanzania and was Secretary General of the then East African Community (EAC). So was conceived the title of this story, “From Goatherd to Governor”. Thestorycouldhave endedat theendof my tenure asGovernor but beginning in 1975 other, perhaps even more interesting parts were still to come. Neither Tony nor I knew that after my term as SecretaryGeneralandthecollapseoftheEastAfricanCommunity in early 1977, I would be appointed Minister for Finance and Planning. Other exciting times were in store, as I moved, rather dramatically, from the Ministry of Finance to become a coffee farmer at the beginning of 1980. Less than three years later, I found myself a nominee of Mwalimu Nyerere’s Government as an Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund based in Washington DC and sitting on the Board of one of the most prestigious financial institutions in the world. The stint in Washington for four years saw me as a real globetrotter, (another “G”), for in my capacity as Executive Director representing all English-speaking Africa, except the then apartheid South Africa, I visited practically all countries in Africa. Indeed, I even touched on apartheid South Africa several times when on my way to or from my constituent countries of Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Mozambique. As a Tanzanian national, I could only at that time stay in the transit lounge of the Johannesburg International Airport when waiting for flight connections. My Tanzanian passport was specifically stamped that South Africa was excluded from the countries I could visit when using it. I was also able to tour most of the countries of Asia, Europe and South America. Those of North...

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