Tanzania court jails opposition leader for incitement, lifts treason charge

Dismissal of treason charge means Tundu Lissu avoids threat of death penalty in a trial that has drawn international condemnation.

A Tanzanian court has jailed opposition leader Tundu Lissu for four years on a charge of incitement.

The ruling was handed down on Friday in a trial closely watched internationally, during which the court dismissed a charge of treason that carried the threat of a death sentence.

“We are satisfied that through his statements, the accused intended to disrupt elections and instigate violence,” the judge told a courtroom packed with Lissu’s supporters.

“We sentence you to four years in prison but the doors are open for appeal,” the judge added.

Lissu, who heads the main opposition party, Chadema, responded that the trial was “political persecution”, accusing the judges of following orders from the government of President Samia Suluhu Hassan.

“Excuses were created to imprison me,” he told the court.

“I was not charged with incitement but you judges are convicting me with it just to impress the person who gives you the titles. I believe these were directives,” he said.

Lissu was arrested before last year’s presidential vote, in which Hassan was re-elected, and has spent 19 months in jail.

Security was heightened across the commercial capital, Dar-es-Salaam, and around the court before the verdict, as Lissu’s supporters gathered for the hearing.

The case has drawn criticism from British and European Union lawmakers, who described it as politically motivated and called for Lissu’s immediate release.