The Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) was the principal political party in the struggle for sovereignty in the East African state of Tanganyika. The party was formed from the Tanganyika African Association by seventeen founders on 7th July 1954, namely S. M. Kitwana, Kisung'uta Gabara, John Rupia, Japhet Nkura Kirilo, Mwalimu Julius Kambarage Nyerere, Germano Pacha, Abubakar Ilanga, Joseph Kimalando, Dossa Aziz, Tewa Said Tewa, Constantine Oswald Milinga, Lameck Makaranga Bugohe, Patrick George Kunambi, Joseph Kasella Bantu, Ally Sykes, Abdulwahid Sykes and Saadan Abdul Kandoro. From 1964, the party was called the Tanzania African National Union. On 5th February 1977, the TANU merged with the ruling party in Zanzibar, the Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP), to form the current Revolutionary State Party or Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM). The policy of TANU was to build and maintain a socialist state aiming towards economic self-sufficiency and to eradicate corruption and exploitation, with the major means of production and exchange under the control of the peasants and workers.