Polls have opened in Tanzania for presidential and parliamentary elections being held without the leading opposition party, as the government has been violently cracking down on dissent ahead of the vote.
More than 37 million registered voters will cast their ballots from 7am local time (4:00 GMT) until 4pm (13:00 GMT). The election commission says it will announce the results within three days of election day.
President Samia Suluhu Hassan, 65, is expected to win after candidates from the two leading opposition parties were barred from standing.
The leader of Tanzania’s main opposition party, Chadema’s Tundu Lissu, is on trial for treason, charges he denies. The electoral commission disqualified Chadema in April after it refused to sign an electoral code of conduct.
The commission also disqualified Luhaga Mpina, the candidate for the second largest opposition party, ACT-Wazalendo, after an objection from the attorney general, leaving only candidates from minor parties taking on Hassan.
In addition to the presidential election, voters will choose members of the country’s 400-seat parliament and a president and politicians in the semiautonomous Zanzibar archipelago.
Hassan’s governing party Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), whose predecessor party led the struggle for independence for mainland Tanzania in the 1950s, has dominated national politics since its founding in 1977.
Hassan, one of just two female heads of state in Africa, won plaudits after coming to power in 2021 for easing repression of political opponents and censorship that proliferated under her predecessor, John Magufuli, who died in office.
But in the last two years, rights campaigners and opposition candidates have accused the government of unexplained abductions of its critics.
United Arab Emirates Dirham Exchange Rate
