Tanzania: Amnesty denounces impunity after hundreds killed
By the AFREEQUE newsroom, based on Amnesty
Amnesty International says no Tanzanian officials have been prosecuted over the deadly crackdown on protests that followed the 2025 general election, despite hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries. A year after the violence, the authorities are keeping the inquiry commission’s report secret and using counterterrorism laws against critics, according to the organisation.
Amnesty International has accused the Tanzanian authorities of failing to open any criminal investigation into officials over security forces’ violence, which killed hundreds and injured thousands after the 2025 general election. The organisation made the accusations on the first anniversary of the crackdown.
A commission of inquiry report into deaths linked to election violence was handed to President Samia Suluhu in April 2026, but has not been made public, according to Amnesty. In August, the president inaugurated a new commission tasked with identifying those who planned, financed, coordinated or carried out the violence, as well as examining the excessive use of force and the fate of missing people.
Tigere Chagutah, Amnesty’s regional director for East and Southern Africa, says counterterrorism laws are increasingly being used to silence critics. The organisation says it has documented arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, abductions and restrictions on freedom of expression and assembly over the past year, targeting opposition figures, media outlets and dissenting members of the governing party.
President Samia Suluhu has repeatedly accused foreign actors of funding the post-election protests in an attempt to overthrow the government, Amnesty International reports.
