‘We won’t let them get away with this’: activists to sue Tanzania’s government over ‘sexual torture’ | Tanzania

The two East African activists say they plan to sue the Tanzanian government for illegal detention and torture during a visit to support the opposition politician in May.

Boniface Mwangi from Kenya and a Ugandali Agather Athaire sent a shock waves at an emotional press conference that they had an emotional press conference that they claimed to have been sexually assaulted at the beginning of this month and after their arrest in Dar Es Salaam. “[The authorities] Take you to sexual torture, Mw Mwangi said.

Even in a region accustomed to violations of recurrent rights, the significant targeting of foreigners by the Tanzanian authorities made a new and worrying return with pressure on President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s critics and opponents.

In interviews with Guardian, Mwangi and Atuhaire In a Tanzanian court and East African Court of Justice and the African Court, they plan to initiate lawsuits in regional and international means, including human and public rights.

“We will not let them get rid of it,” he said, “a well -known Kenya photojournalist and activist Mwangi said. Atuhaire, the lawyer, journalist and critic of the Ugandan President of the Government of Yoweri Jeveni, said: ız We must hold these men responsible for knowing that they cannot violate people who have not been provoked. ”

Mwangi and Atuhaire, who traveled to Tanzania to attend a court hearing against a betrayal against the opposition politician Tundu Lissu on May 19, say that they were taken by the people they described as security guards from their hotels, and they were taken illegally and orally and physically.

Mwangi said that his tattoo began in a immigration office in which a security official in the afternoon he had repeatedly punched in the presence of Atüire and three lawyers. Authorized, security personnel, activists to disrupt peace and destroy the country to destroy a police station accused of traveling to Tanzania, he said.

“Real torture, Mw Mwangi said, that evening, when he had bloody eyes and described the smell of alcohol, a group of about seven people and a woman handcuffed it and put it in a component.

Both activists said that they were ordered to peel in the compound, and they were hung upside down, and then they were shot with wooden boards on their floor. They said that their attackers drowned Mwangi’s underwear in her mouth and drowned their screams by putting some cloth in Atetuhaire’s mouth.

The activists said that their attackers placed those who look like their hands or other objects in their rectums, and that they found feces on Atetuhaire’s body, then photographed it and not to explain what happened. Two days later they were thrown into the borders of their country.

Im I didn’t see we go out there, Atu said Atuaire. “Really, it was really painful.”

Mwangi said: “Nothing has prepared me for it in my mind or life. I was wounded before, I was beaten before, I was shot before. My house was bombed. I saw all kinds of extremities and cruelty, but I never felt such pain.”

Guardian approached the Tanzanian police spokesman for a comment. UN Representative of Tanzania last week, Abdallah Possi, said A meeting of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva: “Although these allegations are extremely suspicious against the government, we take the allegations of torture, sexual abuse and bad practices very seriously. Therefore, the government is investigating and if it is established, those who are interested can account.”

During the past year, a series of murders, kidnapping, arrest and torture caused local and internationally condemnation. Among those killed was Mohamed Ali Kibao, a member of the Main Opposition Party Secretariat, and Chamaa, whose beaten was beaten and his face was soaked with acid in September.

In April, Father Charles Kitima, a Catholic priest who was vocal in democratic reforms and rights issues, was brutally attacked near his residence. At the beginning of this month, the government announced a church of Josephat Gwajima, a politician from the ruling party, a prayer campaign to seek an illegal detention and forced disappearance and to seek divine intervention for Hassan and other national leaders. And last week, two men who spoke about democracy and governance on Youtube were arrested for “inappropriate use of social media”.

There is no evidence of personal participation in the events condemned by many of Hassan. However, opposition politicians and rights campaignists say that his administration has returned to fear -based tactics of his predecessor John Magufuli. At the beginning of this month, he warned activists from neighboring countries against tanzania against “arrogant”.

Tanzanian rights activist Maria Crocus Tsehai described the targeting of the Tanzanians as the “Great Panic Sign” until the first presidential election test of the Hassan administration.

Tsehai, who was driven by himself in Nairobi, said, “A very insecure presidential candidate,” he said. “This security device needs to lean further. And he decided that he does not want to make any free or fair elections. He only wants to take his second period. And this decision comes at a very heavy price.”

Last year, Tsehai was kidnapped by the armed men from the streets of the Kenya capital, and he was afraid that a lot of victims were forced to deported from Kenya. However, after a short time, the abduction news was released without crossing the border after the news spread rapidly to social media.

In the months after Hassan took office in 2021 after Magufuli’s death, the President received internal and international approval to reconcile with the opposition and reverse Magufuli’s repressive policies. But since then, a wave of print has eliminated permanent reform hopes.

Hassan’s CCM Party has ruled the country since independence. Opposition and civil society for a long time, critics, the president and the ruling party said that they have given excessive power to the constitutional reform.

Earlier this year, Lissu was arrested and accused of betrayal and cyber crimes, and the Chama Party called for boycott of this year unless election reforms came into force.

Mwangi said CCM was moving to protect itself. “What Suluhu is trying to do is win a choice in any way,” he said. “Reading from a dictator guide [that says] ‘Submit people to submit and beat them to submit’. “

Atuhaire, who won an international woman of courage from the United States last year, showed him and Mwangi’s experience showing him the “lack of unpunished” in Tanzania.

Activists still Nursing injuries In addition to psychological trauma, feet and other parts of their bodies. They said they decided to talk about the allegations of shedding light on the situation of the Tanzanians.

A Atuhaire said, “There is no shame or stamping that is more important than in pursuit of justice,” Atuhaire said. “Justice is the driving factor – these people should be responsible for doing us for doing the Tanzanians.”