TANU (Organization)

The Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) was the principal political party in the struggle for sovereignty in the East African state of Tanganyika (now Tanzania). The party was formed from the Tanganyika African Association by seventeen founders on 7 July 1954, namely S. M. Kitwana, Kisung'uta Gabara, John Rupia, Japhet Nkura Kirilo, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, Germano Pacha, Abubakar Ilanga, Joseph Kimalando, Dossa Aziz, Tewa Said Tewa, Constantine Oswald Milinga, Lameck Makaranga Bugohe, Patrick George Kunambi, Joseph Kasella Bantu, Ally Sykes, Abdulwahid Sykes and Saadan Abdul Kandoro. From 1964, the party was called the Tanzania African National Union. On 5 February 1977, the TANU merged with the ruling party in Zanzibar, the Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP), to form the current Revolutionary State Party or Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM). The policy of TANU was to build and maintain a socialist state aiming towards economic self-sufficiency and to eradicate corruption and exploitation, with the major means of production and exchange under the control of the peasants and workers (Ujamaa-Essays on Socialism; "The Arusha Declaration"). Julius Nyerere was the first President of Tanzania, serving from the 1960s to 1985. In 1962, Nyerere and TANU created the Ministry of National Culture and Youth. Nyerere felt the creation of the ministry was necessary in order to deal with some of the challenges and contradictions of building a nation-state and a national culture after 70 years of colonialism. The government of Tanzania sought to create an innovative public space where Tanzanian popular culture could develop and flourish. By incorporating the varied traditions and customs of all the people of Tanzania, Nyerere hoped to promote a sense of pride, thus creating a national culture.