The opposition shouts abuse after winning the KMC elections – DW – 02.12.2024

Tanzania’s ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party won more than 98% of the seats in last week’s local elections, official results show.

The CCM has dominated the East African country’s politics for decades, and many saw the poll as a test of Tanzania’s democratic institutions ahead of the October 2025 presidential election. It was also the first time that President Samia Suluhu Hasan’s popularity was tested in a vote. .

The result appears to be a resounding success for the 64-year-old leader, who took over in 2021 after the death of President John Magufuli.

Godwin Gonde Amani, a lecturer at the Dr. Salim Ahmed Salim Center for International Affairs in Dar es Salaam, said CCM’s landslide victory marked the end of the party’s 60-year dominance in Tanzanian politics.

“The ruling party has advantages in rural areas where other parties cannot campaign or have very low support, and they have invested a lot,” Amani told DW.

The opposition criticizes the conduct of the elections

On the eve of the vote, the opposition Chadema party protested what it believed to be the unfair disqualification of some of its candidates. It also reports that three of its members were killed in incidents related to local elections, and accuses the authorities of vote fraud.

Human rights groups and Western governments cite a crackdown, with opposition politicians facing frequent arrests, kidnappings and killings. The body of Tanzanian opposition youth leader Abdul Nondo was found washed up on a beach in Dar es Salaam on Monday, a day after he was reportedly kidnapped in the city. The Catholic Church in Tanzania condemned the violence, saying the country was going through “a difficult period filled with pain and suffering”.

“It’s evil, but unfortunately we don’t see it strongly condemned,” said Archbishop of Judea Thaddeus Ruwaichi.

In 2019, the opposition boycotted the election, citing violence and intimidation, paving the way for a clean sweep of the JCC seats.

However, President John Magufuli’s efforts to weaken the ability of opposition parties to participate in politics have come at a cost. He was often at odds with Western partners, and international investment in Tanzania stagnated.

When Suluhu Hassan became president after Magufuli’s death, political observers hailed her for breaking away from Magufuli’s repressive restrictions on the opposition and the media in Tanzania.

“President Magufuli has had some setbacks for elections and democracy in general,” Amani said. “When Samia Suluhu came to power, she called for stability and reconciliation and tried to show that the opposition was given equal opportunities to participate in politics.”

Seen through this lens, “she has achieved much better results in the field of democracy than Magufuli”.

The opposition faced structural problems in the elections

According to Amani, some officials tried to use outdated mechanisms to control the opposition.

Conrad John Masabo, a political science lecturer at the University of Dodoma, said it was important to distinguish between President Samia Suluhu’s rhetoric and her actions as a representative of the JCC and the institutional framework governing elections and democracy in Tanzania.

Is the Tanzanian government trying to silence the opposition?

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“We should look at the whole system, which is largely set up in favor of the existing ruling party, and that hasn’t changed since we went back to multi-party system in 1992,” he told DW.

He said that while Samia Suluhu had initially signaled a willingness to make changes, she could not “make significant changes to laws or regulations that could change the political space in Tanzania”.

Masabo, other observers and the opposition have said that for meaningful change to occur, Tanzania’s constitution, which has remained largely unchanged since its ratification in 1977 when the country was a one-party state, needs to be reformed.

“What we are seeing is a disconnect between the rhetoric that has been important to bring investors back into the country and action on real structural change in Tanzania’s political system,” said Fergus Kell, an analyst at London-based Chatham House. , – told DW.

President Suluhu wants to rebrand Tanzania

In September, a joint statement by the head of the European Union mission, as well as the embassies of Great Britain, Canada, Norway and Switzerland, expressed concern about “recent reports or acts of violence, disappearances and deaths of political activists and human rights defenders”.

In response, President Samia Suluhu Hassan reprimanded Western countries, including the United States, for criticizing Tanzania’s internal affairs.

But it’s a balancing act for Tanzania’s first female president. In terms of foreign policy, it is trying to “rebrand” Tanzania, according to Godwin Gonde Amani:

“One of the key thrusts of her campaign is to try to show the people of Tanzania and the world that Tanzania is open to good partnership and business relations.” Suluhu recently represented Tanzania at the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro.

Hopes are high after Tanzania’s first appearance at the G20 summit

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For Amani, Suluhu’s efforts to open up the country came after the international community distanced itself from Tanzania over her predecessor Magufuli’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and allegations of human rights abuses.

Edited by Crispin Mwakideu