Tanzania’s opposition parties have roundly rejected the findings of a government-appointed commission investigating the post-election violence that erupted in October 2025, accusing authorities of orchestrating a whitewash to shield those responsible for the bloodshed. The commission — chaired by Mohamed Chande Othman — concluded that at least 518 people were killed during weeks of unrest following President Samia Suluhu’s contested landslide victory. But opposition leaders say the report fails to hold the security forces accountable for what they describe as a systematic crackdown on dissenting voices. “The commission has told us that all the violence was planned, coordinated, financed, and executed by people with training and equipment for war,” said a spokesman for the CHADEMA-led opposition coalition. “They are describing a rebellion — but what we saw was a government using the army against its own people.” The opposition argues the death toll is far higher than the official figure and that hundreds more remain missing.
The violence erupted after the October 29, 2025 presidential election, which African Union and Commonwealth observers described as neither free nor fair. The CHADEMA party contested results showing Suluhu winning more than 80 percent of the vote, alleging widespread ballot-stuffing and intimidation in rural strongholds that traditionally support the opposition. Within hours of the announcement, protests erupted in major cities across the country’s commercial heartland — Dar es Salaam, Mwanza, Arusha, and Dodoma — and quickly spread to smaller towns where the security response was fiercer and more lethal. Human rights organisations say security forces deployed live ammunition against crowds on multiple occasions. The government initially imposed a communications blackout, cutting social media access and restricting mobile data before fibre optic lines were also disabled in several regions. The blackout lasted nearly three weeks before connectivity was partially restored.
The Diplomatic Fallout
Regional human rights organisations have called for an independent international investigation, a demand the Suluhu government has firmly resisted. The EU and United States both issued statements expressing concern about the commission’s findings and calling for accountability, messages that the administration appears to have received but not acted upon. The political crisis is complicating Tanzania’s outreach to Western donors and multilateral lenders just as it seeks to attract investment into its energy, mining, and infrastructure sectors. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, speaking at a Semafor World Economy Summit panel alongside Standard Bank Group CEO Sim Tshabalala, noted that the broader East African investment climate was being tested by governance concerns in several major markets simultaneously — a reference that regional observers read as pointedly including Tanzania.
What Comes Next
The opposition, for its part, has refused to concede legitimacy to Suluhu’s second term and is organising what it says will be a prolonged campaign of peaceful resistance. Whether the two sides can find any common ground before the next electoral cycle is, at this point, entirely unclear. Tanzania now joins a growing list of East African nations navigating serious post-election political crises — a trend that analysts say is testing the region’s democratic institutions at precisely the moment they are most needed.