Opposition leaders released after mass arrests

Several leaders of Tanzania's main opposition party Chadema and hundreds of their supporters were last week released after mass arrests over a banned youth meeting in the southwest of the country. The Daily Maverick reports that human rights organisations have criticised the arrests, with Amnesty International saying they were part of efforts to intimidate the opposition in the run-up to local government elections later this year and a national election in 2025. Police banned the meeting in the city of Mbeya that the party’s youth wing planned to hold on Monday on the grounds that it was likely to ‘breach the peace’. More than 500 party supporters were arrested. President Samia Suluhu Hassan has taken some steps to ease restrictions on the media and opposition since coming to power in 2021, but rights groups say arbitrary detentions have continued.