By Dr. Shaaban Fundi
The problem with the “Hadhi Maalumu first, citizenship later” argument is that it ignores both history and political reality in Tanzania.
First, the Hadhi Maalumu debate did not begin yesterday. This issue has been on the national table for more than 12 years, dating back to the Constitutional Assembly debates during the Katiba process. Tanzanians abroad have discussed, proposed, negotiated, and waited for over a decade.
Therefore, presenting Hadhi Maalumu as some new strategic breakthrough is historically inaccurate. It is an old conversation that has already been exhausted politically.
Second, let us stop deceiving ourselves. There is already political will in Tanzania for either Hadhi Maalumu or Dual Citizenship. The debate is no longer about whether the state is aware of the issue. The state fully understands the issue. Parliament understands it. The Executive understands it. The diaspora has spoken repeatedly and consistently.
Believing that the government simply “does not know” or is “not ready yet” is a fool’s dream.
The real issue is not awareness. The real issue is what type of relationship Tanzania wants to establish with its own people abroad.
Third, and most importantly, many of us are not fundamentally fighting for Hadhi Maalumu or even Dual Citizenship as isolated legal arrangements. What we actually want is a NEW CONSTITUTION — Katiba Mpya — that clearly recognizes citizenship by birth as a natural and permanent right.
Our position is simple:
If you are born in Tanzania, or born anywhere in the world to one or two Tanzanian parents, then you are automatically a citizen of Tanzania by blood and birth.
That citizenship should not disappear simply because you acquired another citizenship elsewhere in the world for work, family, education, security, or opportunity.
What many people deliberately misunderstand is this:
We are arguing that Dual Citizenship protections should primarily apply to natural-born Tanzanians by blood, birth, or lineage.
A Tanzanian by birth should never lose citizenship simply because they acquired citizenship elsewhere in the world.
At the same time, foreigners seeking Tanzanian citizenship through naturalization can still be required to renounce their previous citizenship if Tanzania chooses to maintain that policy.
These are two completely different legal and moral questions.
Protecting the birthright citizenship of Tanzanians abroad is not the same thing as opening unrestricted dual nationality to every foreign applicant on earth.
Citizenship is not a government favor. It is an identity. It is ancestry. It is history. It is belonging.
No Tanzanian should wake up one morning and suddenly become “less Tanzanian” because they accepted citizenship in Canada, America, Britain, Australia, South Africa, or elsewhere.
That is precisely why the current Citizenship Act remains deeply problematic and outdated in a globalized world.
The argument that we should “accept half a loaf” would make more sense if Hadhi Maalumu was being presented as a temporary transitional mechanism toward guaranteed constitutional citizenship rights. But many Tanzanians fear that Hadhi Maalumu could instead become a permanent substitute designed to avoid confronting the real constitutional question altogether.
And that constitutional question is very simple:
Can a Tanzanian lose their birthright simply because they crossed borders and built a life elsewhere?
Many of us believe the answer is NO.
This is why the struggle must remain bigger than permits, residency privileges, or investment incentives. Those are administrative benefits. They are not citizenship.
A permit can be revoked.
Citizenship by birth cannot.
Katiba Mpya is therefore the central issue. Everything else is secondary.
We are not asking Tanzania to “give” us Tanzania.
We already belong to it.
By Dr. Shaaban Fundi
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