Jakaya Kikwete
Jakaya Kikwete
Jakaya Mrisho Kikwetewas the fourth President of Tanzania, in office from 2005 to 2015. Prior to his election as President, he was the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1995 to 2005 under his predecessor, Benjamin Mkapa. He has also served as the Chairperson of the African Union in 2008–2009 and the Chairman of the Southern African Development Community Troika on Peace, Defence and Security in 2012–2013...
NationalityTanzanian
ProfessionWorld Leader
Date of Birth7 October 1950
CityMsoga, Tanzania
CountryTanzania, United Republic of
People who sow seeds of discord by preaching tribalism, racism and religious misunderstanding should find another place to go.
If people want to get into leadership through corrupt practices, through corrupt means, I think that's detestable; we have to take action.
The presidency is not an office job.
There were times when there were riots in Africa, demonstrations against the IMF because of the policy advice they were giving, the conditionalities they were imposing, and the difficulties that arose out of the implementation of those conditionalities.
Tanzania is standing by the people of Zimbabwe including President Mugabe... Mugabe is there, he is president, he has been elected. If Tanzania had simply said, stupid, you're hopeless, a murderer, a violator of basic human rights; does that remove Mugabe from office? It doesn't.
My government is going to deal with all forms of corruption. White-collar corruption will be high on the list and we are going to plug all gaps that are being used by corrupt leaders (and) business people.
Justice has to be done, justice must be seen to be done, what the AU is simply saying is that what is critical, what is the priority, is peace. That is priority number one now.
Roads are the blood vessels of the economy.
There are no demands - undue demands... There are many questions we get? why China? why now and the answer is why not?... There is no any hidden agenda in our cooperation with China, it is a relationship based on mutual understanding and equality; they understand our situation.
Africa needs access to markets.
It's very sad that Tanzania is a poor football country. If elected, I promise to put this country on the world football map. I will make sure we produce our own Okochas, El Hadji Dioufs and Zinedine Zidanes here.
We cannot continue to mourn about our country being poor while our minerals are lying untapped and with harvesting at Lake Natron, we will not be the first to do so, because our neighbours, Kenya, are doing the same on the other side of the lake.
Those who expect radical changes in policy and direction are mistaken and lost. The government of the fourth republic will build on what was undertaken by previous governments and will continue with all good things.
I don't think they (the Chinese) have better friends in Africa than us. But when we compare to how much money we get, if we succeed, if the MCA is funded by the US Congress for Tanzania, it's going to be $700 Million. It's going to be huge, it may be a total of all the Chinese have been giving us all these years.