When does opposition become treason in east Africa?

This October in Tanzania and next January in Uganda millions of people will take part in a mass political ritual. Most will call it an “election”, for want of a better term. But in both countries the ballot is an exercise of state power, not a realistic chance to choose who should wield it. Rulers are already preparing—by charging their opponents with treason.

The Ugandan case targets Kizza Besigye, who has run four times to be president. He was kidnapped on a visit to Kenya in November, shuttled across the border, and accused of plotting to overthrow Uganda’s government by force. In Tanzania Tundu Lissu, the opposition leader, was arrested on April 9th. The charge sheet cites comments he made threatening civil disobedience. Three days later his party was disqualified from the election.

The cases illustrate the mechanisms of electoral authoritarianism. Between 1989 and 2006 more than 40 African countries introduced, or reintroduced, multi-party elections. In some, like Ghana, democracy has taken root. But in others incumbents learned to tilt the playing field by threatening opponents, stifling the press, and buying support. Liberal institutions were grafted clumsily onto illiberal politics.

That produced strongman rulers who are happy to hold elections, but not to risk losing them. Yoweri Museveni, Uganda’s president, has ruled since 1986 and twice had the constitution amended to stay in power. His son and would-be successor Muhoozi Kainerugaba, who commands the army, can barely be bothered to keep up the democratic pretence. In January he wrote on X, a social-media platform, that he would like to behead Bobi Wine, an opposition leader who has been tortured.

In Tanzania the discourse is gentler, though hardly free. The ruling party has governed since independence in 1961. Under John Magufuli, who became president in 2015, it stuffed ballot boxes and crushed dissent. When he died in 2021 his successor, Samia Suluhu Hassan, promised reform and lifted a ban on opposition rallies. But she has faced dissent within the party and resurgent activism outside it, says Nicodemus Minde of the Institute for Security Studies. Repression is tightening again. The party won a dubious 99% of positions in local elections last year.

In authoritarian countries critics are easily cast as traitors, since taking on the ruling party means challenging the state. Mr Besigye does not trust the electoral process and has repeatedly tried to instigate a popular uprising. Mr Lissu is leading a campaign called “no reforms, no election”, urging his supporters to disrupt the vote unless institutions like the electoral commission are made more independent. “The commission is in cahoots with the CCM [the ruling party] to rig the election,” argues Rugemeleza Nshala, his lawyer.

The treason charge is not the worst thing to happen to Mr Lissu, whom unknown gunmen riddled with bullets in 2017. He will probably not be convicted, but the case will keep him out of sight, embroiled in endless court dates. For Mr Besigye, who has been charged with treason twice before, the routine is familiar. He was denied bail on April 11th. “There’s a price you pay for challenging the status quo,” says Doreen Nyanjura, the deputy mayor of Kampala, who is one of his allies.

This kind of lawfare can galvanise popular outrage. Hakainde Hichilema, charged with treason in 2017, is now president of Zambia. Ousmane Sonko, charged with corrupting youth and fomenting insurrection in 2023, became prime minister of Senegal a year ago. Such a turnaround seems improbable in Uganda or Tanzania. But in their prison cells, the “traitors” are not giving up. ■

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