'Intended killings': Tanzania's election violence ensnared unsuspecting victims

Around 8:30 p.m. on October 31, a group of policemen appeared in the Mjimwema neighbourhood of the Tanzanian city of Mwanza, where residents were running errands and drinking coffee. Without warning, they opened fire in different directions, triggering panic.

The officers ordered men who had taken shelter in a nearby cafe to lie on the ground and then shot at them, three witnesses told Reuters. By the time shooting subsided, more than a dozen lay dead, they said.

A video posted on social media in early November and verified by Reuters shows the aftermath - 13 limp bodies splayed on the blood-soaked ground.

The massacre in Mjimwema, reported by Reuters in detail for the first time, is one of the deadliest known incidents from days of violence around Tanzania's October 29 elections.

Reuters interviewed nine witnesses to eight other incidents in Mwanza as well as Tanzania's commercial capital Dar es Salaam and the northern city of Arusha who said they saw officers shoot at people who were not protesting, sometimes kilometres away from any known demonstrations.

Driven by the exclusion of leading opposition candidates from the elections and a surge of arrests and alleged abductions of government critics, the violence was the worst political unrest in Tanzania's post-independence history and has undermined its reputation for stability.

The U.N. human rights office estimates hundreds were killed and the U.S. government says it is reviewing its relationship with the country, partly as a result.

The demands by mostly youthful demonstrators for more accountable governance echoed so-called Gen-Z protests in countries like Kenya, Madagascar and Nepal, which have forced major reforms or toppled governments.

Charles Kitima, the secretary-general of the Tanzania Episcopal Conference, the country's Catholic bishops organisation, said police deliberately targeted civilians.

"We have witnessed lots of people killed in their houses. That's why we say it was intended killings," Kitima told Reuters.

He acknowledged some looting occurred: "But overall protesters were not criminals. They were demonstrating their needs."

Palamagamba Kabudi, a senior Tanzanian official, said the government takes concerns about the use of force seriously and has created a commission of inquiry to investigate election violence. However, he said many allegations were based on unverified and out-of-context information.

"The Government does not recognise a policy or practice of intentional brutality against civilians," Kabudi, Minister of State in the President's Office, told Reuters in written responses to questions.

"Security operations are conducted for specific law-enforcement purposes and are governed by legal safeguards."

President Samia Suluhu Hassan was declared winner of the presidential election with nearly 98% of the vote. In public remarks, she has defended the security response as a reasonable reaction to violence by protesters.

Hassan, previously vice president, came to power in 2021 when her predecessor died in office and the vote was her first electoral test. After initially promoting democratic reforms, Hassan has in recent years clamped down on opponents her government accuses of trying to disrupt elections and foment instability.

After young people in several cities took to the streets on election day, authorities cut internet access across Tanzania for more than five days, limiting access to information and reliable accounts of violence.

Shortly before the connection was restored, police threatened legal action against anyone who shared images that "cause panic or degrade a person's dignity".

Independent human rights experts appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council said in December that “disturbing reports” indicated security personnel were given "shoot to kill" orders during an enforced curfew, without saying where that information came from.

Kabudi said the government "categorically rejects claims that 'shoot to kill' orders were issued as policy".

The U.N.-appointed experts estimated at least 700 people had been extrajudicially killed but said other estimates pointed to thousands of potential victims.

Kabudi acknowledged that lives were lost but said it would be premature to issue a definitive death toll. The commission of inquiry's findings would be published "in due course", he said.

WITNESSES DESCRIBE KILLINGS FAR FROM PROTESTS

Witnesses interviewed by Reuters from Mwanza, Dar es Salaam and Arusha, Tanzania's three biggest cities, described widespread vandalism during protests, saying some demonstrators set fire to government offices, properties belonging to ruling party members and public infrastructure.

But, according to the witnesses, police shot civilians not involved in demonstrations and fired indiscriminately into crowds of protesters.

In most cases, the witnesses said they did not know why the police acted the way they did. In some, officers appeared to be targeting civilians accused of ignoring orders the officers had issued to go home, they said.

Reuters was unable to ascertain the legal basis for these orders.

While the police announced on state television a dusk-to-dawn curfew in Dar es Salaam after the initial violence, Reuters could find no evidence of an official curfew or lockdown order for Mwanza or anywhere else.

The national police spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

POLICE SHOT CAFE PATRONS

From the hills above Lake Victoria, people in Mjimwema could see demonstrations elsewhere in Mwanza on October 30 and 31, but there was no unrest in the immediate area, six residents told Reuters in telephone interviews.

Nonetheless, at around 6 p.m., police came through the neighbourhood to order people who were shopping or watching television in cafes to go home, an instruction that was largely ignored, a witness said.

Around two hours later, about half a dozen police officers - some in the green police uniforms worn by many field units, others dressed in black - arrived on foot and began firing their weapons in different directions, four witnesses said.

Terrified people scattered. One of the witnesses hid in a house. Another sheltered in a nearby bar.

In one cafe, a wooden structure that had no official name but showed soccer matches, patrons switched off the television and the lights in hopes of going unnoticed, said two witnesses who were inside. One of them said he then snuck out a back door and sprinted to a nearby compound. The other remained inside.

When the police reached the door, they ordered those inside to come out and lie on the street, said three of the witnesses.

The witness still inside the cafe said he crawled out, as instructed by the officers. He recalled a stream of insults from the police but at no point did the officers explain their actions, he said.

Then the shooting started. For around 30 seconds, the witness stayed still. "They would shoot again if they noticed you were moving," he said.

After the police left, firing into the air as they departed, he rose, shaken but alive. He said he saw over 15 dead and wounded people around him.

A video posted on social media platform X by a U.S.-based Tanzanian activist on November 5 showed 13 lifeless bodies, surrounded by pools of blood, most face-down near the cafe's entrance. The ground is strewn with sandals, a glass bottle and a cell phone.

A voice can be heard saying: "All of them are dead. This is murder."

In a photo taken by a witness and verified by Reuters, nine of the same bodies are visible.

Two of the witnesses – the one hiding in the bar and the one who fled to a nearby compound – said they saw at least 14 bodies after the shooting.

A few minutes later, police officers in green uniforms pulled up in a large vehicle, loaded the bodies inside and drove off, according to four witnesses, the fourth of whom had returned to the area after taking shelter down the road.

A man in his 20s with a gunshot wound arrived at the nearby Sekou Toure Hospital around 10 p.m., saying police shot people at a Mjimwema cafe, said a person at the hospital that evening. Less than an hour later, police brought about 15 young men - all but one were dead from bullet wounds, he added.

Kabudi said authorities are reviewing the Mjimwema incident but require verified information before drawing any conclusions.

SOME VICTIMS NEVER FOUND

Thirty-nine-year-old Raphael Esau Magige and his 27-year-old nephew Johnson Patrick Deus went to the cafe that evening to watch the television news, a family member said.

Neither was politically active, the family member said. Deus, who was learning to drive for a job he had landed in Dar es Salaam, had a young son. Magige, a tailor, had a teenage daughter.

Family members identified their remains at the Sekou Toure hospital mortuary. Deus had been shot four times, including in the ribs and the chest, while Magige had been shot three times in his neck and chest, the family member said. They were buried on November 4.

Another victim was 20-year-old Juma Shaban Joseph, a domestic worker and fervent supporter of Dar es Salaam’s Simba S.C. soccer club, a family friend told Reuters, citing witnesses who saw his body at the scene.

Like the families of many victims nationwide, Joseph's relatives have searched city hospitals and mortuaries in vain for his body, the person said.

In their November statement, the U.N. Human Rights Office cited “disturbing reports” that security forces had taken bodies to undisclosed locations "in an apparent attempt to conceal evidence".

Kabudi denied there was a policy of concealing bodies or evidence.

The cafe in Mjimwema is no longer standing, according to a photo taken in mid-December. A few weeks after the incident, one of the witnesses said he saw workers dismantling the structure. Reuters could not determine who ordered this.