A network of activists now wants Kenya's Boniface Mwangi and Uganda's Agather Atuhaire compensated after they were tortured for days by Tanzania authorities.
Under the umbrella of Jumuiya, the lobby groups say the incident mirrors others in Kenya and Uganda, and they want the Tanzanian government to apologise to the two. "Mwangi and Agather were blindfolded, forced to strip naked, and tied by their hands and feet, with their bodies chained, hanging below," they said in a statement.
They say the two underwent brutal beating and torture while being forced to say "Asante Mama Suluhu", while this terrifying process was all being recorded. "They spent days walking on their knees, crawling to bathe themselves to wash off the blood, as they could not stand after the torture, handcuffed and blindfolded, in solitary confinement for four days, with the occasional verbal, psychosocial and physical abuse along the way." The activists say Tanzania's President Samia Suluhu wanted to silence critical voices about her leadership, but had achieved the opposite. "This mounting repression has galvanised a broad and unified movement of young and old, united in purpose and conviction." The activists said that they had information that Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania intelligence agencies are collaborating across borders to target critics. "We will pursue every possible avenue of seeking justice, under the local, regional and international human rights laws to prosecute the dictators, and their accomplices from Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya." They also want an explanation from Suluhu's administration on Mwangi and Atuhaire's illegal detention and why police never brought charges against them.
The activists also want an inquest on the illegal detention and torture to be undertaken by the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights for Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania.
