Dar es Salaam, Tanzania — Tanzania’s President Dr. John Pombe Magufuli has died at the age of 61, Vice President Samia Suluhu Hassan has announced.
In a televised speech on the national broadcaster TBC, the Vice President announced that the President died of a heart complication on March 17, 2021, at about 6 PM at state-run Mzena Hospital in Dar es Salaam where he was admitted on March 14.
“It is with great regret that I inform you that today, 17 March 2021, at 18:00, we have lost our courageous leader, President John Pombe Magufuli of Tanzania,” said Hassan.
The Vice President said Magufuli was first briefly admitted to the Jakaya Kikwete Cardiac Institute on March 6 but was subsequently discharged.
But he was rushed to the hospital again on March 14 after feeling unwell. She announced that the nation will observe a 14-day period of mourning.
The shocking news comes after weeks of speculation on his whereabouts with the suspicion that he had been hospitalized for COVID-19.
President Magufuli has not been seen in public for 18 days and a flurry of rumors suggested that he was ill.
The speculation had led to several arrests, as the government attempted to curb the spread of false rumors.
On Tuesday, the opposition leader from the Alliance for Change and Transparency (ACT Wazalendo) issued a statement asking for Magufuli’s whereabouts.
The party also urged the police to release all citizens who have been arrested for circulating rumors about the president’s health.
There has been a flurry of wild conspiracy theories and speculations on social media that the 61-year-old president may have contracted Coronavirus and been airlifted to a Kenyan hospital for treatment and subsequently flown to India a day later.
Tanzania’s main opposition leader Tundu Lissu, who lives in Belgium in exile, said, citing sources that Magufuli was gravely ill from COVID-19, exacerbated by underlying health conditions.
According to the Constitution, Vice President Samia Suluhu Hassan is now the acting president of Tanzania.
While a date for her swearing-in has not yet been announced, she will be Tanzania’s first female president.
Born in Chato, Geita Tanzania, in 1959, Magufuli studied chemistry and mathematics at the University of Dar es Salaam. He subsequently worked as a chemistry and mathematics teacher. He was first elected as an MP in 1995, became a cabinet minister in 2000 and first elected president in 2015.