During the 1930’s the Kingdom good news had been preached in Tanganyika, so that by 1948 there was a small number of publishers serving in the southwestern part of the country. Who were they? How did they learn of the truth?

They were mainly the people of the Nyakyusa tribe, located in the highlands near the northern tip of Lake Malawi where the two branches of the Great Rift Valley converge. From here men went to work in the Rhodesian copper mines. Friendly and teachable people by nature, for some this employment opened the way to come into contact with the truths from God’s Word.

Hosea Njabula, born in 1901 near Tukuyu, abounded in zeal for his Moravian Protestant faith. He became a deacon, teaching Sunday school in many villages. Among his students was Nehemiah Kalile. One day in 1930, while working in Vawa (Vwawa) as a cook for European settlers, Nehemiah found himself in a deep Bible discussion with another cook.

Nehemiah discovered that this man knew amazing things from the Bible. This was the truth! Soon thereafter he crossed the border to Mwenzo for baptism. Here he was deeply impressed when, for the first time, he saw the seven volumes of Studies in the Scriptures.

Nehemiah Kalile was full of enthusiasm. He yearned to tell his former Sunday-school teacher about his discovery. So the next year, he again met his older friend, Hosea Njabula, and told him about the truth.

Over 60 years later, Hosea remembers that day and says: “I argued very much, but when he showed me the Scriptures regarding the Sabbath, I knew it was the truth. Without delay I started to preach to others, including Job Kibonde. The three of us started meetings in my house. I also went to see my other Sunday-school students. I then invited them to our meetings. Several accepted, among them Joram Kajumba and Obeth Mwaisabila.”

On Foot All Over the Highlands

After Brother Njabula’s baptism in 1932, these brothers, without knowing what a pioneer minister was, preached like pioneers. They walked 36 miles [60 km] toward Lake Malawi and witnessed in the area of Kyela, where Hosea Njabula and Obeth Mwaisabila met strong opposition. Even though they did not know how to swim, they were seized and thrown into a river full of crocodiles. Somehow, perhaps with Jehovah’s help, they escaped with their lives. Soon after this they built their first Kingdom Hall near Buyesi village in a place they called Bethlehem.

In the meantime, more interest developed in Vawa, where Nehemiah Kalile had first heard about the truth, and such men as Solomon Mwaibako, Yesaya Mulawa, and Yohani Mwamboneke took their stand. Those in Buyesi made the loving arrangement to send one of their number to the village of Ndolezi near Vawa once a month in order to strengthen these newer ones. This meant hiking 60 miles [100 km] each way. Sometimes they trudged even over 120 miles [200 km] to Isoka in Northern Rhodesia to send their reports to the congregation there and have them passed on to the branch office.

Today, six decades later, at the age of 90, Hosea Njabula is still a “deacon,” now in the true sense of the word, a ministerial servant in the Ndolezi Congregation. Brother Njabula has the satisfaction of seeing his faithful wife, Leya Nsile, continue steadfast by his side, as well as having several grandchildren active in the pioneer work.

Others also had many years of zealous preaching. Among these were Jimu Mwaikwaba, who endured imprisonment because of the good news; Joel Mwandembo, who later served as a circuit overseer; Semu Mwasakuna, who preached by bicycle and song; Ananiah Mwakisisya; and Timothy Kafuko.

Another brother who helped greatly to advance Kingdom witnessing was David Kipengere, who was born in 1922 and learned the truth in 1935 in Mbeya. He preached far and wide and was later sent to open up the work in Dar es Salaam. He was a regular pioneer for the last 18 years of his life, right up until his death in 1983. Often he was arrested, but he did not give in to discouragement, saying: “There is much work in prison that Jehovah wants me to accomplish.” His brother, Barnabas Mwakahabala, who learned the truth with him, is still serving as an elder to this day. These brothers did what they could in their isolated circumstances, without literature in their own language and with limited reading ability.

Contacts with the branch office in Cape Town were sporadic, and reports were unreliable. The 1943 Yearbook indicates that 158 in this area shared in the preaching work, and in 1946, there were 227 reporting in seven congregations. During previous years, the activity of the Witnesses in Tanganyika was apparently included in the reports of the Isoka Congregation in Northern Rhodesia, and some reports probably got lost. Several years were still to pass before better supervision could be given to the ingathering work in southern Tanganyika.

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Hosea Njabula and his wife, Leya, were among the first ones to spread the good news in Tanzania

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Nine of those who learned the truth in southern Tanzania during the 1930’s. From left to right: Andrew Chungu, Obeth Mwaisabila, Timothy and Ana Kafuko, Leya Nsile, Joram Kajumba, Jimu Mwaikwaba, Stela and Semu Mwasakuna