Chema Chajiuza: A Good Thing Sells Itself
In this case, Tanzania is that good thing. Yet, while looking at our hub data recently, we made a curious observation. We noticed that Tanzania is getting less than a quarter of the external peer funding we track flowing to our Kenya and Great Lakes hubs, and less than half of that going to the southern Africa hub. So we decided to ask Tanzanians in the 2025 cohort of the African Visionary Fellowship whether they had any idea what could be driving this pattern, and also make a case for why funders might want to forge stronger bonds with local organization leaders in the country.
Conventional grants are often restrictive and make little to no provision for operational costs such as salaries. Pius Matunge of Tengeneza Generation credits funders like Segal Family Foundation for unrestricted multiyear grants that allow for day-to-day survival alongside organizational growth. To Matunge, there’s no such thing as a small grant. “Every grant is a big grant, the difference is in the terms and conditions,” he says. Inflexible funding forces the focus to be on implementation only, yet attracting and retaining highly competent staff is key if an organization is to rise to the next level. Without dedicated fundraising professionals on the team, local leaders are often a one-person band yet it’s difficult to do deep donor engagement when working alone and wearing so many hats. Nancy Iraba, co-founder of Aqua-Farms Organization, emphasizes relationship-building as a crucial ingredient in a landscape where leaders primarily await open calls. She also noted that foreign-faced organizations tend to secure funding easier (this is why our African Visionary Fellowship exists!), partly due to their existing rapport with the Global North from where the bulk of philanthropic funding originates. In the words of Kyaro Assistive Tech co-founder Colman Ndetembea, “We need to get more comfortable interfacing with foreign funders.”
This is where gatherings like Segal Connect come in. Named after one of the main things we do, the gathering is designed to be a comfortable mingling of our grantee partners in a particular hub and like-minded funders interested in the region; last year’s was held in Malawi, this year’s will be in Tanzania. We invite our funder friends to come for the coastal treasures, the national parks, and the rich history – but we would also like them to direct more funding towards Tanzanian organizations. Why? Because there is excellent work happening in this East African nation, ranging from national policy change to fostering financial resilience among young women: Doris Mollel Foundation successfully advocated for extended maternity leave for mothers of preterm babies, and Her Initiative won the 2023-2024 King Baudouin Foundation Africa Prize. Our grantee partners are being recognized for innovating in education and educating through animation, like Shule Direct who recently won an award from Tanzania Digital, and Tai whose feature film was screened at the Silicon Valley African Film Festival among others. The leaders of these organizations are remarkable visionaries — the likes of Kellen Msseemmaa who has been selected for the 2025 Skoll Fellowship, Nafisa Jiddawi who is redesigning healthcare on the Zanzibar archipelago, and 90 year-old Clotilda Kokupima who still ardently advocates for elder rights. The list is long and the accolades are many, we cannot possibly do everyone justice in so brief an article; see the range of Tanzanian excellence for yourself (sort by location).
More multiyear unrestricted funding will enable Tanzanian organizations to strengthen their systems and establish longer-term sustainability. Aqua-Farms Organization co-founder Jerry Mang’ena described how Dovetail Impact Foundation funding enabled them to acquire tools to create a digital fundraising pipeline for directing and tracking their efforts. He also mentioned that prior to working with Segal Family Foundation, he had not even known that private philanthropy existed. Word of mouth is a powerful thing, and the value of personal interaction cannot be overstated. Pius Matunge expressed a desire for comfortable spaces to connect with funders away from the typical grant solicitation environment; that’s what we’re going for in Dar es Salaam in May.
