Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan won the country’s presidential election with nearly 97.66% of the votes, according to the electoral commission’s results released on Saturday.

The electoral body recorded a turnout nearing 87% of the country’s 37.6 million registered voters.

Suluhu Hassan’s biggest opponents have cried foul over the result, saying that opposition parties were disqualified from taking part and that mass protests marred the vote.

Dio Gracias Monishi, a spokesman for Tanzania’s main opposition party CHADEMA, told DW the result showed the election was a “total fraud.”

Monishi also disputed the turnout, saying that “Tanzanians were in the streets, not in the polling stations,” referring to the anti-government demonstrations across the country during the election.

Main opponents blocked from vote

CHADEMA was disqualified in April from the election, after it refused to sign a code of conduct and its leader Tundu Lissu was charged with treason.

Opposition party ACT-Wazalendo was also disqualified from the vote, leaving only minor parties to face off against Suluhu Hassan .

The 65-year-old rose to power in Tanzania in 2021, following the death of her predecessor, John Magufuli, while he was in office.

Suluhu Hassan will now lead the East African country of 68 million people for another 5 years.

Hasan’s Chama Cha Mapinduzi party has ruled the country since independence more than 60 years ago.

Protests and lockdown

Tanzania’s election was marred by political violence, with protests and clashes taking place.

Protests began on Wednesday during the vote, with demonstrators tearing down banners of Suluhu Hassan and setting fire to government buildings. Police responded by firing tear gas and gunshots, according to witnesses.

CHADEMA said on Friday that hundreds of people had been killed in the protests, while the UN Human Rights Office could only confirm at least 10 protest-related deaths in three cities.

Monishi told DW on Saturday of “hundreds of casualties, life-threatening injuries and from the reports we are gathering on the ground, there are many people who have died.”

He accused security forces of “atrocities” and “crimes against humanity,” adding that the actual number of casualties will only become clear once internet connection is restored.

The government rejected the opposition’s death toll as “hugely exaggerated” and imposed a lockdown on Wednesday night to keep people from taking to the streets.

Suluhu Hassan said in a televised address that her government “strongly condemns” the election protests.

“We thank the security forces for ensuring that the violence did not stop voting,” she said. “These incidents were not patriotic at all.”

Rights violations allegations ahead of vote

Human rights groups such as Amnesty International reported a pattern of enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and extrajudicial killings in Tanzania ahead of the polls.

In June, a UN panel of human rights experts said more than 200 cases of enforced disappearance have taken place in Tanzania since 2019, saying they were “alarmed by reports of a pattern of repression” ahead of elections.

Tanzania’s president oversaw “an unprecedented crackdown on political opponents,” they said.

The International Crisis Group said in its most recent analysis on the country that the Tanzanian government has curbed freedom of expression, ranging from a ban on X and restrictions on the Tanzanian digital platform JamiiForums “to silencing critical voices through intimidation or arrest.”

Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru