John Magufuli, President of Tanzania, dies at 61

John Magufuli, during a rally in Dar Es Salaam in October 2015.Khalfan Said / AP

John Magufuli, 61, and president of Tanzania since 2015, has died in Dar Es Salaam as a result of heart disease, as confirmed by the country's vice president, Samia Suluhu, in a televised message on Wednesday.

After 18 days of mystery in which the Tanzanian head of state had disappeared from public life, all kinds of rumors and comments had spread about his health and a possible contagion of covid-19, which has not been confirmed.

A week ago, the opposition leader Tundu Lissu, exiled in Belgium, assured that Magufuli had caught this disease, but the government was quick to deny it.

The authoritarian Magufuli was the great denialist leader of the coronavirus pandemic in Africa, he resisted providing data on infections, expelled the representatives of the World Health Organization (WHO) from the country, assured that Tanzania was protected from the disease Through divine intervention, he refused to impose social distancing measures or curfews and has rejected vaccinations.

The first rumors that Magufuli, nicknamed

in his country

could have covid-19 began when, after his absence from public life, a Kenyan newspaper published that "an African leader" was being treated for this disease in Nairobi.

However, the Tanzanian authorities were not long in coming out to deny it.

Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa said last Friday that Magufuli was in "good health" and explained that he was still working hard, "as always."

This Monday, the vice president asked citizens to "ignore the gossip" and added that Tanzania "is now full of rumors coming from abroad, but they must be ignored.

It is quite normal for someone to have the flu, fever or some other illness, "he commented.

Last February, Tanzania experienced a wave of deaths initially attributed to pneumonia, but which, in the absence of official data and tests, it is suspected that they could be due to covid-19.

Several personalities died suddenly that month, first the vice president of the Zanzibar archipelago, Seif Shariff Hamad, 77, and then the Chief Secretary of the Government, John Kijazi.

The Minister of Economy, Philip Mpango, coughed and breathed with difficulty at the press conference in which he reported this latest death.

On February 19, during his funeral, Magufuli admitted the existence of "a respiratory illness" in Tanzania, without specifying whether he was talking about the coronavirus.

Magufuli was elected President of Tanzania for the first time in 2015 and since then he has been characterized by his authoritarian style and his fight against corruption and public waste.

He was reelected to the post last October with 84% of the vote amid allegations of fraud by his main rival, the aforementioned Tundu Lissu.