Ntimbanjayo Millinga

In the 1960s, a great anti-imperialist movement swept the world. President Julius Nyerere urged Tanzanians to reject capitalist exploitation, and build a society based on African communalism. Ntimbanjayo Millinga with a few others and hardly any funding put these views into practice and built an extraordinary rural society based on equity between women and men, young and old. By 1969, 17 ujamaa villages had formed the Ruvuma Development Association (RDA). But the governing party was so hostile to grassroots power that, against Nyerere’s will, they closed it down. Tragically, Millinga died in 2008. But the RDA he led is a beacon in our struggle today.