Tundu Lissu faces Nov. 6 treason ruling in Tanzania

Tanzania’s High Court is due on Nov. 6 to rule on opposition leader Tundu Lissu’s treason charge in a 17-witness prosecution, The Africa Report said in a Nov. 5 viewpoint.

The ruling matters beyond one defendant: Lissu has been detained since April 2025, while at least 374 treason defendants documented by The Chanzo within two weeks of the 2025 election amount to more than five times CHADEMA’s count of 71 party leaders facing treason or terrorism charges, according to Atlas360 calculations.

Justices Dunstan Ndunguru, James Karayemaha and Ferdinand Kiwonde are to decide whether Lissu, CHADEMA’s chairman, committed treason through remarks at a party meeting seven months before the 2025 election. The article said prosecutors cited his warning that without electoral reform “we will disrupt this election” and make things “stink badly”.

The Africa Report said the charge sheet alleges no weapon, no plan, no payment and no violence. It said the state is seeking a death sentence, while treason is non-bailable in Tanzania and Lissu was denied bail after 202 days in custody.

The evidentiary record is disputed. The article said the court in October 2025 rejected a flash disk, memory card and forensic report linked to video of the speech, and that none of 11 listed exhibits was admitted. It said nine of 17 prosecution witnesses testified under pseudonyms, under rules introduced three months after Lissu’s arrest.

The bench found in August that Lissu had a case to answer. The Africa Report said the decision did not address Hatibu Gandhi v Republic, a 1996 Court of Appeal precedent the article described as holding that words alone do not amount to an overt act of treason.

The case has drawn wider scrutiny of Tanzania’s legal process. Amnesty International said supporters were violently arrested and that some reported sexual torture, according to the article. The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found Lissu’s detention arbitrary in February 2026, the article said.

Atlas360 reported on Oct. 27 that CHADEMA said Lissu had begun a hunger strike after 14 months in detention, saying prison authorities had denied his lawyers access before the Nov. 6 judgment.

The article also placed the prosecution in a broader opposition crackdown after CHADEMA was barred from contesting the October 2025 election and President Samia Suluhu Hassan was declared winner with 97.66% of the vote. Authorities arrested more than 2,000 people after the vote, according to the article.

The case carries implications beyond party politics. The Africa Report said Tanzania is marketing major projects including a $42 billion LNG development, the standard gauge railway, critical minerals and the East African Crude Oil Pipeline. The LNG project is the largest investment figure cited in the article, giving the judicial-independence dispute a scale that reaches into Tanzania’s pitch to investors.

Washington’s 2026 Investment Climate Statement cited “a widespread perception of undue political interference” in Tanzania’s judiciary, according to the article. The Africa Report argued that courts unable to protect political defendants from weakly supported capital charges may also struggle to reassure foreign investors over state disputes.

The Nov. 6 checks are:

• Nov. 6: whether the High Court convicts, acquits or otherwise disposes of the treason charge against Lissu.

• Nov. 6: whether the ruling addresses the rejected video evidence, pseudonymous witnesses and the Hatibu Gandhi precedent cited by The Africa Report.

• Nov. 6: whether the judgment changes Lissu’s detention status after custody that began in April 2025.

Source: viewpoint article, The Africa Report, Nov. 5, 2026