Carnegie Reporter, Vol. 2, No. 1 | M.L. Luhanga an interview, page 4 (low bandwidth)

MLL: We started very early—I think about nine or ten years ago—to try to convince the government that students must pay a portion of the costs of studying at the university. That system is still not in place, though I think most countries south of the Sahara now charge a certain percentage of the costs for training a student.

SK: Do you think that’s important that students pay part of the tuition?

MLL: I think it’s important because right now, the majority of the population, the people who are not enjoying the university’s educational services and benefits, are the ones who are bearing the costs. So the students at the university—a small part of the population—who are benefiting from higher education and who are getting the social and private benefits from it, must pay a percentage of it. That’s what’s fair. Those who come from very poor families, however, should be exempt—they should be provided with scholarships, and so on. We are still doing that.

SK: A question for the long term. The Partnership to Strengthen African Universities is expected to be a ten-year partnership. But twenty years from now, thirty years from now, will the university be able to stand alone financially so that it will not have to suffer any negative consequences of the economy?

MLL: In a country like Tanzania, it is sometimes hard to think long term. In the U.S., with its strong economy, you can look twenty years down the road, but when you are in one of the twenty-five poorest countries in the world, sometimes it’s very difficult to have that long of a time horizon.

I’ll give you an example. About five years ago, we had a tremendous drought and people were dying of hunger, so the government had to abandon its budget in order to import a lot of food to feed the population. Less than a year later, we had the El Niño rains. Towns, homes, businesses, whole communities were being washed away. It was a terrible tragedy for the whole country, for everyone. So in Tanzania, sometimes you move from one disaster to the next and often you abandon your budget. Planning becomes a major problem.

Since we’re a public university, the government has always favored us and we did not suffer as much. But the government ministries were actually surviving from month to month—they were getting a budget on a monthly basis. It was that bad. But we were being given a three-month budget and the allocation that they gave us was exactly the amount that had gone through parliament. Others did not fare that well because the calamities that had befallen the country had to be addressed.

SK: For the long term, then, the financial strength of the university will have to depend on multiple financial opportunities: support has to come from foundations, tuition and the state.

MLL: Yes. Especially if we can get the government to move on charging students for part of the tuition. Not a hundred percent, but some percentage of the tuition. Those who cannot afford to pay should be given consideration by the government for scholarships. I think that if we head toward a partial student-paid tuition system, it would be a tremendous move forward. In our strategic plan we noted that there are others who benefit from the work of the university and they must also take part in its financing. Ways of involving businesses and others must be developed in order for the university to at least move toward being self-sustaining.

SK: I want to ask you a personal question before we close. What made you choose an academic career?

MLL: I think it was mainly because of my performance in university and my love for academics. I just enjoy reading. I read quite widely in very many fields. I also consume a lot of novels, a lot of newspapers, and so on. I thrive on debate and in discussing issues. I would not change this career for anything else, either politics or something like that.

SK: Did you get this love from your parents?

MLL: Yes, my parents encouraged me very much to study as much as possible, and even with the low level of knowledge that they had, it was incredible that they encouraged all of us. My late father had twelve children, and he encouraged all of us to continue our education and to study up to our limits. Not all of us made it into academia, but we made it as far as we could.

SK: And what is your specialty? What is your field?

MLL: I’m a telecommunications engineer.

SK: And you became vice chancellor because you were the best debater?

MLL: No, I’m not sure about that. Here in Tanzania, the vice chancellor is appointed by the president of the country. I was chief academic officer, which is the next position to the vice chancellor, and the president appointed me to that post. Before then, I had not held any administrative position in the university. So the president appointed me to be chief academic officer, and then four months later he appointed me to be vice chancellor.

SK: Is it a wonderful job or is it a burden?

MLL: It can be a real burden. I had avoided being in an administrative job in the university. As I told you, I’m a consummate academician. I enjoy reading, doing research and supervising students, not sitting on committees and so on, but when the president calls you and asks you to do something, you don’t say no. So I didn’t say no, and I couldn’t say no.

SK: Last question. There have been a lot of headlines this summer about U.S. Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill joining the rock star from Ireland, Bono, for a tour all over Africa, saying that the world must respond to the needs in Africa. What is the perspective from your point of view of such a tour?

MLL: I think these publicity things are mostly for the media. The media gives them two or three minutes on TV and then you forget them. It doesn’t help anybody. I think the problems faced by Africa need long-term solutions and serious attention, and unless they are looked at in that way, then nothing changes. I’m not one to play these publicity games. If we want to address serious problems, and to change the future of Africa for the better, we should really put in place serious programs which are long term, and can be sustained.

* In 2000, the presidents of four U.S. foundations—Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation—announced the creation of The Partnership to Strengthen African Universities, an initiative aimed at supporting the improvement of higher education institutions in a number of sub-Saharan African countries. The joint effort recognizes the importance of higher education in reducing poverty and stimulating economic and social development in Africa.

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