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Zanzibar’s first vice president Seif Sharif Hamad, who led the island’s opposition for three decades, died on Wednesday, the president said, after being hospitalized for more than three weeks with coronavirus.
Tanzania and its semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar have played down the threat of the virus, which President John Magufuli says has been prayerfully repelled.
However, Hamad’s ACT-Wazalendo party announced in January that the 77-year-old had been hospitalized with the virus.
“Hamad died this morning at Muhimbili National Hospital in Dar es Salaam where he was hospitalized,” Zanzibar President Ali Hassan Mwinyi said in a short speech broadcast by public television ZBC.
“The nation has truly lost a patriotic leader. I also declare seven days of mourning and the national flag will fly at half mast during.”
Magufuli also expressed his condolences in a message on Twitter.
None of the leaders mentioned the cause of death.
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