Tanzania heads to the polls with President Samia Suluhu Hassan seeking her first direct mandate since taking office in 2021 following John Magufuli’s death. But the elections come under a cloud of fear, with widespread reports of abductions, arrests, and killings of opposition members. Major opposition leaders, including Tundu Lissu, have been barred or jailed, leaving the field largely uncontested for Hassan and her ruling CCM party. Rights groups accuse her government of intensifying the same repressive tactics seen under Magufuli. Early voting in Zanzibar has also raised concerns over irregularities, deepening tensions ahead of the main election day.
In the lead-up to the general election, opposition figures, activists, and government critics reported surveillance, intimidation and arbitrary detentions, while local civil society organisations said political rallies and dissent were increasingly restricted.
Tanzania’s main opposition party, Chadema, said it would boycott the presidential and parliamentary elections unless the government implemented what it calls ‘fundamental electoral reforms’.
The protest move followed disqualification by the National Electoral Commission (NEC) earlier this year over Chadema’s refusal to sign the mandatory electoral code of conduct, arguing that participating under the existing rules would legitimise what it perceives as an unfair playing field.
Chadema’s disqualification came amid broader political tensions, including a treason charge brought in April against party leader Tundu Lissu, who was blocked from contesting. Another prominent opposition figure, Luhaga Mpina of ACT-Wazalendo, was also barred from seeking the presidency.
Lissu and Mpina’s absence from the ballot leaves Hassan – the East African nation’s first female head of state after the death in 2021 of sitting President John Magufuli – all but certain to win another term.
“Her widely anticipated victory would be only the third time a woman has been popularly elected as president of an African country. But beyond this, the polls are more of a historical relic,” wrote Chatham House research fellow Fergus Kell.
“Not since before the advent of multi-party democracy in Tanzania has the ruling [Chama cha Mapinduzi] CCM party, in power since independence, faced so little competitive opposition.”
While Tanzania is a multiparty democracy, a version of Hassan’s CCM – whose name translates as the Party of the Revolution – has been in power since the East African country won independence from Britain in 1961.
Rights and pro-democracy groups, such as Amnesty International and Freedom House, say that under Hassan, there has been a narrowing of political space, although her government maintains that legal processes are being followed.
“Having removed any realistic opposition threat, [Hassan] could have had a free run to present a truly coherent policy vision in line with recent strategic and economic ambitions. Or she could have preserved some of Tanzania’s democratic credentials by allowing a more open electoral playing field. She chose to do neither.”