Tanzania’s main opposition party on Tuesday declared its disqualification from upcoming national polls was unconstitutional, only a week after its leader was detained and charged with treason.
The east African nation’s authorities have increasingly cracked down on its opposition, with the Chadema party accusing President Samia Suluhu Hassan of returning to the repressive tactics of her predecessor John Magafuli months before October’s general election.
Last week, Chadema leader Tundu Lissu was detained and charged with treason — a capital offence — in a move that provoked outrage, with Amnesty International calling for his immediate and unconditional release.
Lissu has led a forceful charge against the government, promising that its supporters would not participate in polls without significant electoral reforms and refusing to sign an electoral code of conduct — a move that prompted officials to announce over the weekend that Chadema had been disqualified.
“It is our argument that the actions taken by the Independent National Electoral Commission contravene the Constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania,” the party’s chief lawyer Rugemeleza Nshala said.
Nshala argued that the party’s constitutional rights cannot be revoked by “regulations” issued by the electoral body.
It said such actions could amount to “sufficient grounds to nullify the election”.
The opposition accused the government of advancing an agenda that will undermine the upcoming poll and “ensure that the ruling party remains in power”.
“For us to have agreed to this ridiculous agreement would have meant legitimising an unfair electoral process,” lawyer Robert Amsterdam, international counsel to the party, said of the electoral code.
“It will make a farce of the entire process,” he told AFP.
– Long ignored –
President Hassan’s party, Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), swept to victory in local elections last year.
Chadema said those elections had been manipulated, and that it would petition the high court to demand reforms ahead of the upcoming polls.
Lissu last year warned that Chadema would “block the elections through confrontation” unless the electoral system was reformed.
The opposition’s demands have been long ignored by the ruling party.
Fulgence Massawe, director of a legal rights NGO based in the country, told AFP that an electoral code of conduct was used during the 2020 election to suspend Lissu from campaigning for about a week, giving his opponent, the late Magufuli, an upper hand.
“They have seen how this code of conduct is used against the opposition party, especially the strong candidates,” Massawe said.
Hassan was initially feted for easing restrictions imposed by Magufuli on the opposition and the media in the country of 67 million people.
But rights groups and Western governments have criticised what they see as renewed repression, with the arrests of Chadema politicians as well as abductions and murders of opposition figures.
In a statement following the detention of Lissu, Amnesty described a “campaign of repression” by authorities, criticising the “heavy-handed tactics to silence critics”.
