tanzania’s crackdown has a feminist face
once hailed as a break from the ruling party's authoritarian playbook. tanzania’s president is now jailing opponents, torturing activists, and banning rivals from elections. the mask is off.
Last month, Kenyan activist and photojournalist Boniface Mwangi and Ugandan lawyer and journalist Agather Atuhaire were arrested in Dar es Salaam. Where they had traveled to attend the court hearing of Tanzanian opposition leader Tundu Lissu. According to their public testimonies, they were abducted from their hotel, blindfolded, interrogated, and then sexually assaulted and tortured by Tanzanian security officers. Mwangi, who spoke at a press conference in Nairobi, said he was hung upside down, beaten, and sodomized with objects while his attackers filmed the abuse and forced him to say 'Asante’ (thank you in Kiswahili) to President Samia, a cruel gesture meant to mock and humiliate him. Atuhaire said she was raped. Both were later dumped near their respective borders and forced to leave the country.
