Be Neutral, Envoy Tells Tanzanians

The Citizen (Dar es Salaam)

Ibrahim Bakari

28 May 2011

Tanzania’s ambassador to Egypt, Mr Ally Shauri Haji, has urged Tanzanians living or studying here to desist from engaging in local politics for their own safety.For the past few months, the political situation in Egypt has been volatile following demonstrations which led to the ouster of former president Hosni Mubarak, who is currently facing corruption charges along with several of his family members.

Mr Haji made the remarks when talking to The Citizen on Sunday shortly after welcoming Simba Sports Club players ahead of their match yesterday evening against Wydad Casablanca in an African Champions League playoff.

The envoy urged Tanzanians to concentrate on their studies or work, and avoid involvement in North African country’s internal issues, especially politics.”What is happening here is purely for Egyptians themselves to handle… it is better for Tanzanians to concentrate on what brought them here.

“If it is studying, let them study hard and immediately return home after their studies. That is what I have been telling them,” he reiterated.However, he noted that about 80 Tanzanians living or working in Egypt, most of them students, so far have been keen on pursuing what brought them here.

“We have directed them that if anything happens to them they should immediately report to the embassy so that we can see how to help them,” he said. Commenting on the Tanzanians in Libya and Yemen, which are also engulfed in political turmoil sweeping across the Arab world, Mr Haji said that a few Tanzanians had gone to Cairo following the unrest in Libya and Yemen, and that the majority of them had already returned home.

“We are also monitoring the situation closely here…things have not normalised yet. If we see the situation getting out of hand we might close our office and return home. “Earlier, when the situation worsened, the Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation ministry sent a chartered plane and we evacuated most of our workers at the embassy. We returned after things had cooled down a bit,” he explained.

He said that during the peak of the violence, many other countries also closed their embassies and returned their staff home for their own safety.

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