The President of Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, has expressed deep regret for the harm caused by his country during its colonial rule in Tanzania.
He spoke at a museum in Songea, where a significant anti-colonial uprising, known as the Maji Maji rebellion, occurred.
During the early 1900s, German forces were responsible for the deaths of nearly 300,000 people in the Maji Maji rebellion, making it one of the bloodiest revolts against colonialism.
President Steinmeier, addressing the audience, said, “I would like to ask for forgiveness for what Germans did to your ancestors here.
What happened here is our shared history, the history of your ancestors, and the history of our ancestors in Germany.”
The Maji Maji rebellion was sparked by a German policy that aimed to compel the local population to cultivate cotton for export.
At the time, Tanzania was part of German East Africa, which included areas that are now modern-day Rwanda, Burundi, and parts of Mozambique.
President Steinmeier expressed his hope that Tanzania and Germany could work together to come to terms with their shared past.
He promised to carry these stories back to Germany so that more people in his country could become aware of them.
Historically, Germany had been, until recently, somewhat forgetful of its colonial past, with many of its citizens unaware of the brutality and racism that took place during that era, according to Jürgen Zimmerer, a history professor at the University of Hamburg.
During his visit, President Steinmeier met the descendants of one of the Maji Maji leaders, Chief Songea Mbano, who was executed in 1906.
Today, Chief Songea Mbano is considered a national hero in Tanzania, and the German authorities pledged to help find his remains.
Thousands of human remains were brought from German colonies, in part as “trophies” and also for racist research.
However, there has been little funding available to determine the origins of these bones and skulls, which are scattered across various museums and institutions.
Some descendants of the victims have managed to locate their ancestors’ remains with the help of DNA tests.
During his visit, President Steinmeier also met with President Samia Suluhu Hassan in Dar es Salaam, and he pledged Germany’s cooperation with Tanzania in the “repatriation of cultural property.”
While many in Tanzania welcomed the president’s apology, historian Mohamed Said believed it did not go far enough.
He pointed out the historical tactic of setting farms on fire to deprive people of food and incapacitate
