Tanzania Hopes for reform fade amid wave of repression

When Samia Suluhu Hassan took office as Tanzania's president in 2021, many in the east African country hailed what they hoped was a new dawn after the authoritarian and repressive rule of her predecessor, John Magufuli.

- Carlos Mureithi

The signs were positive in her first few years in office: Hassan ended bans on newspapers and political rallies, and reversed legislation that kept pregnant girls and young mothers out of school, all policies that Magufuli had endorsed.

But opposition leaders say the recent killings of officials, a spate of disappearances, and arrests of government critics and bans on opposition gatherings suggest the end of the reformist approach.

In late November the Chadema opposition party said three of its members had been killed in incidents linked to local elections, which the governing Chama Cha Mapinduzi party won in a landslide. Chadema's chair, Freeman Mbowe, wrote on X that one candidate had been shot dead by police in Tanzania's commercial capital, Dar es Salaam, as he attempted to stop "fake and invalid ballots" being delivered to a polling station.

Chadema said another candidate was shot dead at his home in Mkese in central Tanzania and that a party official was killed in a machete attack at his home in Tunduma near the border with Zambia.