Tanzania tightens security, outlaws protests over disputed election

Tensions are high in Tanzania after the government outlawed planned protests over its disputed victory in elections in October.

Police and soldiers were patrolling largely empty streets in major cities on Tuesday – Tanzania’s Independence Day – after the government preemptively ruled that any protest would be illegal and treated as a coup attempt, and urged people to stay at home.

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Activists have called for protests over the ruling party’s victory in the vote on October 29. Rallies contesting the election met a crackdown in which hundreds of people were killed and more than 2,000 detained.

On Tuesday, police trucks and officers on foot patrolled the commercial capital, Dar es Salaam, the administrative capital Dodoma and the northeastern city of Arusha, while roadblocks were erected near key government installations including President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s heavily guarded offices.

The situation appeared calm as of late morning, although one resident and some activists on social media said small protests had begun in some parts of the city. This could not be immediately confirmed.

Hassan won a new term in the October 29 election with nearly 98 percent of the vote after leading opposition candidates were barred from running.

She appointed a commission last month to investigate election-related violence, but has repeatedly denied that security forces acted with undue force.

United Nations human rights experts said last week that at least 700 people were estimated to have been extrajudicially killed in the violence.

The government has acknowledged that people died, but has not provided its own death toll.

The United States said last week that it was reviewing its relationship with Tanzania over concerns about violence against civilians as well as religious freedom, free speech and barriers to investment.

In the months leading up to the elections, opposition leaders and human rights activists accused the government of being behind the disappearance of dozens of its critics.

Hassan said last year that she had ordered an investigation into reported abductions, but no results have been announced.