Samia Suluhu, Tanzania’s First Female President

Samia Suluhu Hassan is a soft-spoken, veteran politician unexpectedly thrust from the role of vice president to become Tanzania’s first female leader after John Magufuli’s sudden death.

Magufuli died in 2021 following a short illness.

Suluhu was then sworn in as Tanzania’s first woman president on March 17, 2021.

A former office clerk and development worker, Suluhu began her political career in 2000 in her native Zanzibar, a semi-autonomous archipelago, before being elected to the national assembly on mainland Tanzania and assigned a senior ministry.

Rose through the ranks

She rose through the ranks of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) until being picked by Magufuli as his running mate in his first presidential election campaign in 2015.

The CCM comfortably won and Suluhu made history when she was sworn in as the country’s first ever female vice president.

The pair were re-elected in October 2020 in a disputed poll the opposition and independent observers said was marred by irregularities.

She would sometimes represent Magufuli on trips abroad but many outside Tanzania had not heard of her until she appeared on national television to announce that Magufuli had died at 61.

Getting things done

Suluhu was born on January 27, 1960 in Zanzibar, a former slaving hub and trading outpost in the Indian Ocean

Then still a Muslim sultanate, Zanzibar did not merge formally with mainland Tanzania for another four years.

Her father was a school teacher and her mother, a housewife. She graduated from high school but has said publicly that her finishing results were poor, and she took a clerkship in a government office at 17.

By 1988, after undertaking further study, she had risen through the ranks to become a development officer in the Zanzibar government.

She was employed as a project manager for the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) and later in the 1990s was made executive director of an umbrella body governing non-governmental organisations in Zanzibar.

In 2000, she was nominated by the CCM to a special seat in Zanzibar’s House of Representatives. She then served as a local government minister – first for youth employment, women and children and then for tourism and trade investment.

In 2010, she was elected to the National Assembly on mainland Tanzania. Then-President Jakaya Kikwete appointed her as Minister of State for Union Affairs.

She holds university qualifications from Tanzania, Britain and the United States. The mother of four has spoken publicly to encourage Tanzanian women and girls to pursue their dreams.