Background
Lawi Sijaona was born in 1928 at Mnima in Newala district in the far south-east near the Mozambique border.
Lawi Sijaona was born in 1928 at Mnima in Newala district in the far south-east near the Mozambique border.
Educated at St Andrews College, Minaki to Senior Cambridge Overseas Certificate level.
He started work on “Habari za Leo”, a local newspaper and rose to become its editor. He then joined local government as clerk to the Newala local council in 1955, moving to become chairman of the council in the coastal town of Lindi before joining central government.
He became Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Local Government from 1961 to 1962. When Tanzania became a republic in December 1962 he was made Minister for National Culture and Youth, then Lands, Settlement and Water Development and Minister of State in the Second Vice-President’s Office in April 1964.
His major promotion came when he was made Minister of Home Affairs in September 1965, a post he held until June 1967 when he went back to become Minister of State in the Second Vice-President’s Office before being reshuffled to Minister of Health and Housing in October 1968 and Minister of Health and Social Welfare.
In February 1972 he was sent to become Regional Commissioner in West Lake and later Mwanza as part of the new Tanzanian decentralisation policy, 518 where some of the best ministers were given key rural appointments.
A party stalwart and government minister of many years’ standing. He regarded as a tough Minister when he was in charge of Home Affairs. In recent years he has been Minister of Health, but he was one of those chosen as the spearhead of President Nyerere’s decentralisation policy, when he was sent, with some of the best ministers, into the provinces as a Regional Commissioner.