On a recent visit to Tarime town in Tanzania, my friend Muwanga Jumainne told me a story that seems unbelievable but is true, because he heard it first-hand from the victim, who was his maternal cousin.
It is the story of a young man who was caned on the orders of a President and later became Speaker of the whole Parliament. His name was Samuel John Sitta.
Sitta was born on December 18, 1942, in Urambo, Tabora Region, in what was then Tanganyika. He was not born rich. He was born in a village where children walked long distances to school, where books were few and where a teacher's word was law. But he had one thing that many children today are losing: a hunger to learn.
He worked hard, passed his exams and earned a place at the University of Dar es Salaam to study Law. In those days, to be a law student at Dar es Salaam was to be among the brightest minds in the country. The whole nation was watching, and so was the President, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere.
Nyerere was not just a President. To Tanzanians, he was Mwalimu, the Teacher. He believed that a nation is built not by money or buildings but by disciplined people.
At the university, Sitta was bright, bold and outspoken. Like many young students, he loved to argue and to question things, and sometimes he crossed the line. One day, the story goes, his indiscipline reached the ears of Mwalimu. Nyerere did not send a policeman and he did not expel him. He did what a father of that generation did: he ordered him to be caned.
Imagine it. A university law student, a future lawyer, caned like a small schoolboy on the orders of the President of the country. Many students would have broken. Many would have dropped out in shame, or hated Nyerere for the rest of their lives. Sitta did not. He took the cane, wiped his tears and took the lesson.
Later in life, when he told the story, he did not tell it with bitterness but with gratitude. He said the cane taught him what no law book in the library could: before you can lead others, you must first learn to be led, and before you can command, you must first learn to obey. That was his turning point.
From that day, Sitta changed. He did not become a coward; he became disciplined. He was disciplined in class, in his books, in his speech, and in how he treated his teachers, his elders and his fellow students. He graduated in Law, but his real degree was discipline.
He became Member of Parliament for Urambo East for 20 years, from 1975 to 1995. While others jumped from party to party looking for quick money, Sitta stayed and served his people faithfully.
He later became Minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs. In that office, he helped write the Political Parties Act of 1992, the law that brought back multiparty democracy. Today, Tanzanians call him the unsung hero of pluralism because while others were shouting in the streets, Sitta was in his office writing the law that made freedom legal. He also served as Director General of the Tanzania Investment Centre, where investors trusted him because he was disciplined with money and with time.
On December 26, 2005, the boy who was once caned on the orders of the President climbed to the highest chair in Parliament. He was elected Speaker of the National Assembly of Tanzania and held the chair until 2010.
As Speaker, he was known for one thing: discipline. He did not fear ministers or the opposition. If you broke the rules of Parliament, he stopped you. If you came late, he corrected you. If you spoke without respect, he silenced you. He had learned from Nyerere that a house without discipline is not a Parliament but a market.
After that, he served as Minister for East African Cooperation from 2010 to 2015, helping to build the East African Community that Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania, among others, are part of today.
He died on November 7, 2016, in Germany, where he had gone for treatment. Almost 10 years later, on November 3, 2026, Tanzania's Vice President, Deogratias Ndejembi, launched a book about his life in Dodoma and urged young people to read it, not because Sitta was perfect but because he was disciplined.
Dear learner, listen to Sitta's story and learn this: your teacher is not your enemy when he corrects you. Your parent is not your enemy when he punishes you. Your prefect, your headteacher and your lecturer are not trying to destroy you. They are trying to shape you, the way Nyerere shaped Sitta.
Many learners today hate correction. When a teacher tells them to tuck in their shirt, they feel insulted. When a teacher tells them to repeat a class, they feel hated. When a teacher gives them extra work, they say the teacher is wicked. But Sitta teaches us a different way: discipline is not punishment; it is preparation.
The cane that fell on Sitta did not break his future; it built it. The shame he felt that day did not kill his dream; it woke it up. If Sitta had run away from the university after being caned, Tanzania would never have got its Speaker. If he had hated Nyerere, he would never have learned from Nyerere. If he had said, "I am too big to be corrected," he would have remained small forever. Success does not come to the learner who is never corrected. It comes to the learner who accepts correction and changes.
So when you are corrected today, do not cry and say, "They hate me." Ask yourself, "What is this correction trying to teach me?" Sitta was caned on a President's order, yet he became a Speaker. What is stopping you from becoming great after a small correction from your teacher? The chair of success is waiting for you, but you will only sit on it if you first learn to sit down, listen and accept discipline.
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