The Teacher's Country

• Watchlist

THE TEACHER'S COUNTRY is the story of a land 50 years after its independence. It is about Tanzania, a country, which was formed by the ideas of "Mwalimu" Julius Nyerere, who stuck to his ideals and never became a detached politician. The film follows the youngest son of the famous first president on his way to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro. Madaraka Nyerere climbs Africa's highest mountain to reminisce about the struggle for independence which his father was deeply involved in half a century ago. It is also a story reflecting on the development of Tanzania over the past decades, told by people who seem ordinary at the first glance: One is single mother Bertha who lives in Dar es Salaam. She works all day to earn her living and hardly sees her daughter. Laurent Nestory is a teacher on Kome Island on Lake Victoria - an island without electricity or running water. The film also portrays Thomas Bilingi, a catholic priest who is helping very pragmatically with the development of his area in the vast dry hinterland of Lake Victoria. THE TEACHER'S COUNTRY provides a genuine insight into the hopes and disappointments, the achievements, failures and problems of the protagonists in Tanzania 50 years after independence from Great Britain.