On 27 April 1994, when millions voted in South Africa’s first democratic election, Nyerere’s solidarity bore fruit.

On 27 April 1994, when millions voted in South Africa’s first democratic election, Nyerere’s solidarity bore fruit.

When Julius Nyerere committed Tanzania to supporting South Africa’s liberation struggle in the early 1960s, the country was already consolidated as a permanent base for African freedom movements.

Tanzania gave the African National Congress land at Mazimbu for the Solomon Mahlangu Freedom College, established in 1977 as an answer to apartheid education and as a refuge for young South Africans in exile.

Tanzania also hosted early Umkhonto we Sizwe military training at Kongwa in the 1960s. The camp, a former colonial military site in central Tanzania, was used to give MK’s first recruits basic instruction in drill, weapons handling, fieldcraft, and political discipline as the organisation took shape after its founding in December 1961.

Alongside the ANC, Tanzania also hosted the Pan Africanist Congress and its armed wing Poqo — later known as APLA — whose cadres likewise passed through Tanzanian exile and training structures during the early years of armed resistance.

For years, Dar es Salaam hosted the OAU Liberation Committee secretariat, functioning as an operational hub where logistics, finance, travel documents, broadcasting arrangements, and political coordination were managed through Tanzanian state institutions and continental liberation infrastructure.

On 27 April 1994, when millions voted in South Africa’s first democratic election, Nyerere’s solidarity bore fruit.