Ujamaa Urbanism: Tanga Tanzania
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UJAMAA URBANISM: TANGA TANZANIA The exhibition at the Nordic Pavilion at la Biennale di Venezia has been titled “FORMS OF FREEDOM: African Independence and Nordic Models”. The exhibition will explore and document how modern Nordic architecture was an integral part of Nordic aid to East Africa in the 1960s and 1970s. The resulting architecture is of a scope and quality that has not previously been comprehensively studied or exhibited. One of the projects in the exhibition is Masterplan for Tanga Intro: African Independence and Nordic Models The liberation of Tanzania, Kenya and Zambia in the 1960s coincided with the founding of state development aid in the Nordic countries, where there was widespread belief that the social democratic model could be exported, translated, and used for nation-building, modernization and welfare in Africa. The leaders of the new African states wanted partners without a murky colonial past, and established solid bonds with the Nordic countries, built on a mutual belief in progress. During a few intense years in the 60s and 70s, Nordic architects contributed to the rapid process of modernization in this part of Africa. These young architects found themselves in the field between building freedom and finding freedom: Building freedom denotes nation-building through city planning, infrastructure and industry, and institutions for education, health, and state bureaucracy, whereas finding freedom points at the modernist, experimental free area that emerged from the encounter between Nordic aid and African nation-building. Ujamaa Urbanism: Tanga Tanzania “Planning should embody the ideology of the country”. Tanga Master Plan 1975-95. Main Report, Dar es Salaam, 1975 Established as the Tanzanian variant of socialist ideology, Ujamaa was intended to transform a tribal society into an egalitarian, modern welfare society. President Julius Nyerere was of the firm opinion that this transition could not be achieved in a fast growing, market-based city like Dar es Salaam. The second Five Year Development Plan defined a policy for decentralization and regional growth. On outline, this policy resembled Nordic economic models. Initiated by the Tanzanian government and funded by Nordic aid, Finnish architects and planners developed comprehensive regional plans and master plans for the towns of Mbeya, Moshi, Tabora and Tabora. TANGA TOWN The Arusha declaration (1967) provided the framework for these plans, exemplified by Tanga: the objective of social equality established a common environmental, spatial and architectural standard. Ujamaa should be implemented in urban areas by emphasizing activities and urban local units that encourage collective and co-operative efforts. Self- reliance should be promoted by providing citizens with maximum mobility. The towns should be developed to be as self-sufficient as possible, so as to bring it into equilibrium with the countryside, this preventing it from draining resources from the traditional rural villages. TRADITIONAL UTOPIA Spanning the period 1975 to 1995, the Tanga master plan was a piece of comprehensive urban planning that followed the established European methodology of the day. The utopian aspect is evident in the firm intention to modernize a traditional society in a very short time, and to do so by combining traditional social practices with contemporary structuralist architectural principles. This is illustrated in prototypes for urban areas to accommodate 25,000 residents, the Ten Cell System, and the prototype for an Urban Ujamaa Village. TIMELINE 1972: Government administration decentralizes into regions. The population pressure upon Dar es Salaam is to be relieved by concentrating industrial growth, administrative functions and population into 9 centres for urban development. 1973-1975: Preliminary phase, Master plans for Mbeya, Moshi, Tanga and Tabora. Coordinator: Paavo Mänttäri. 1974: Dodoma replaces Dar es Salaam as the capital of Tanzania. Paavo Mänttäri in the Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development, Tanzania, is involved in the preliminary planning phase. Tanga Pilot Survey is done (team leader Rainer Nordberg) and the Master plan for the towns Moshi (team leader Antti Hankkio) and Mbeya (team leader Bo Mallander). 1975: Ujamaa Villages Act. Master plans for the towns Tabora (Team Leader Mårten Bondestam) and Tanga (Team Leader Rainer Nordberg). .