Samia crackdown on EAC citizens curtails freedoms and democracy

The East African Community (EAC) Treaty speaks boldly of promoting democracy, the rule of law and protection of human rights, and also envisions a people-centered community.

But are those lofty words and the East African passport slowly becoming meaningless?

Critics question how tenets such as promotion of good governance for peace, stability and development in the region can be achieved when a member state acts with impunity, abducting citizens of a sister country as happened in Tanzania last week.

The EAC protocol clearly stipulates strict adherence to the rule of law and access to justice, protection of equal opportunities, democracy, its processes, plus combating corruption and enhancing ethics among other values.

To the contrary, Tanzania President Samia Suluhu Hassan demonstrated last week that ordinary citizens in the so called Jumuiya Ya AfriKa Mashariki (EAC) are not as free as envisaged in the treaty when she appeared to order abduction, detention, torture and deportation of politicians, lawyers and human rights activists from Kenya.

“Hatutatoa nafasi kwa kiumbe chochote kuja kutuvurukia hapa kwetu, awe yuko ndani au nje. Hatutoa nafasi (We will not allow any living thing to meddle in our country’s internal affairs, whether are here or outside the country,” said Mama Samia, as she is popularly known.

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Her comments came after prominent Kenyan lawyers and rights campaigners were deported preventing them from attending the court case filed by the government against opposition leader Tundu Lissu of  Chama Cha Demokrasia na Maendeleo (Chadema).

They had travelled to show solidarity with Lissu, who was appearing in court for the first time since his arrest on April 9, 2025. He is facing charges of treason, whose punishment is a death sentence.

Political analysts argue that President Samia is no different from her predecessor John Pombe Magufuli who although popularly elected fluctuated between being an autocratic leader (rule by one person with total power) and anocracy (rule that mixes democracy and autocracy).

However, some positive developments were recorded in Magufuli’s presidency and they included strict adherence to public accountability and containing corruption, vices that remain ingrained in Kenya’s leadership today.

Because of that, despite his high handedness, he managed to gain support of a majority of the population.

Magufuli, who appointed Samia as his deputy when he was first elected, created several unnecessary diplomatic spats with Kenya including burning more 11,000 one-day-old chicks and detaining cattle belonging to Kenyan Maasai herdsmen and auctioning their livestock.

Despite having produced many senior leaders in Tanzania including Prime Minister Edward Sokoine (1977 to 1980) under President Julius Nyerere and Edward Lowassa (2005-2008) under Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete, the Maasai still claim they are seriously marginalised and persecuted by Samia’s government.

Their homes

“When Samia began the onslaught on Maasai community of Loliondo and Sale divisions in Ngorogoro District, in Arusha, it is the Maasai of Narok and Kajiado that have been housing their colleagues from across the border by supporting them and keeping them in their homes,” says Donald Dena, Pan African Lawyers Union chief executive.

The notion that Kenyans are interfering with Tanzania’s internal affairs has also been criticised by lawyers and rights activists who argue that leaders should differentiate between their own interests and daily interaction of citizens in the region.

“We have to separate the people of Tanzania from the government, because citizens in the region are interacting, trading and meeting all the time. East African citizens have long expressed and demonstrated solidarity with each other,” says Dena.

The interaction has continued for many years, including during the Post Elections Violence of 2008 in Kenya, when Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and senior university lecturers in Tanzania mobilised and influenced their government to make timely interventions that ended the chaos.

In 2020, four CSOs from Kenya and Uganda also raised their voices after violent confrontations erupted at the end of presidential elections in Tanzania. Advocacy groups in the country had at the time been silenced through a brutal clampdown by the late Magufuli.

Two months ago when hooded gunmen suspected to be Kenyan security officials attempted to abduct Maria Sarungi Tsehai, a Tanzanian activist in Nairobi, a spontaneous uproar and protests across East Africans saved her from deportation and torture in Tanzania.

East Africans have expressed solidarity with each other on many issues. That is what the Martha Karua, Willy Mutunga and Boniface Mwangi were trying do in Lissu’s trial. If it is indeed a public trial, then Mama Samia should not be afraid of anything.

“Tell Samia, that we the people own the region. You run Tanzania because of the power donated by citizens, but you cannot stop us from engaging. We will continue expressing solidarity to each other mupende musipende (whether you like it or not),” said Dena.

Samia is practically, what can be described as a carry forward of Maguguli’s strongman leadership style.

Magufuli was described as a diehard nationalist who believed in ordering colleagues and civil servants around but also appeared to apply a similar approach when dealing with neighbours at the expense of regional integration.

Were it not for former President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohammed’s diplomatic mastery, the little gains achieved by the East African community could have been seriously eroded.

Before Magufuli, Tanzania had embarked on a serious path of reforms started by former President Benjamin Mkapa and later expedited by his successor, Jakaya Kikwete.

Kikwete, first elected as the fourth president on December 14, 2005, and re-elected on October 31, 2010 for the second term, developed cordial relationship with Presidents Mwai Kibaki and later Uhuru Kenyatta.

The former university student leader was an active participant in African liberation politics and youth movements, who appeared keen on pushing for a more open, inclusive and politically conscious Tanzania, that could relate well with developed and emerging democracies.

There was a huge sigh of relief in the region when Mama Samia succeeded Magufuli after his unexpected death.

Samia became the first woman president in the region from Zanzibar, a region with a long history of fighting for political rights.

However, for regional integration to succeed, it has been argued that the political reforms that opposition leaders in Tanzania are demanding for should be supported and cascaded to other countries in the region.

 Foreign Affairs Principal Secretary Korir Sing’oei says Kenya is way ahead democratically and its citizens should give neighbours like Tanzania time to evolve but critics argue that past efforts to introduce reforms have been frustrated,

Democratic order

“Vis-a-vis our neighbours, I think we are way ahead but we must allow them to also evolve. We can’t impose our democratic order on our neighbours. We have to be careful,” said Sing’oei.

Prof Gitile Naituli of Multi-Media university says the East African Community was built on the bold promise of regional unity — Jumuiya ya Afrika Mashariki — a vision of open borders, shared identity, collective prosperity, and mutual protection.

He argues that it was meant to transcend the colonial borders that once divided us, to weave together the people of East Africa under a common flag of cooperation and dignity. But last week, that dream took a brutal beating in the streets of Tanzania.

“Kenyan activist and photojournalist, Boniface Mwangi, known across the region for his fearless advocacy for justice was denied contact with his consulate, denied basic rights, detained and tortured in silence, by State agents in a country that calls itself a brother to Kenya and a pillar of the EAC.

“Let us be clear: this is not just a violation of rights. It is an assault on the very soul of our regional union. A stain on the conscience of every East African government. A betrayal of the very principles that underpin Jumuiya,” says Naituli.  He described what happened to Boniface Mwangi, as not merely a Tanzanian issue but an East African crisis.