Former Tanzanian President Ali Hassan Mwinyi, credited with ushering the East African nation into free market economics, has died at age 98, current President Samia Suluhu Hassan said on Thursday in a television broadcast.
Mwinyi succeeded Tanzania's first post-independence president, Julius Nyerere, who left office in 1985 after 22 years in power.
"On behalf of the government, I would like to convey my condolences to the family, relatives, friends and all Tanzanians for this loss," President Hassan suluhu announced on state television TBC1,around 5:30 in the evening," adding that he had been receiving treatment for lung cancer.
Mwinyi was credited with introducing free market policies and was in turn succeeded by the late Benjamin Mkapa in 1995.
President Hassan said Mwinyi died in hospital in Dar es Salaam where he was receiving treatment for lung cancer. He had been receiving treatment since November, Hassan said.
His son Dr Hussein Ali Mwinyi, is the current President of Zanzibar, in the Tanzanian archipelago.
Mwinyi had been hospitalised in London in November last year before returning to continue treatment in the main Tanzanian city of Dar es Salaam, Hassan said.
Tanzania will observe seven days of mourning with national flags flown at half-mast.
He removed restrictions on private enterprise and eased bottlenecks on imports, earning the nickname Mzee Rukhsa, a Swahili phrase which loosely translates to Mr Permission.
Born on May 8, 1925 in the former British colony known as Tanganyika, Mwinyi moved to Zanzibar to study Islam.
