Tanzania: Zanzibar's Presidential Candidate Declares Himself Winner

An opposition candidate in Zanzibar on Monday declared himself the winner of the island's presidential election as security agents arrested 191 people during a night raid on opposition tallying centres.

One of those seized was Kenyan, one French and another a Korean.

While Tanzania remained generally calm after the most competitive election since independence, these were some of the signs of tensions as results started trickling on Monday.

Official tallies released on Monday by the National Electoral Commission (NEC) put Dr Pombe Magufuli, the presidential candidate of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), in the lead.

Some 23 million Tanzanians were registered to vote and more than half of all voters live in nine major regions of the country.

Mr Lowassa, who ran under the Ukawa Opposition Alliance, accused NEC of selectively releasing results from CCM strongholds and warned that delays in announcing official results could inflame tensions after the arrests of the party's tallying centre officials.

"All they were doing is collating results from polling stations across the country," Mr Lowassa said at a press conference. "We have been incapacitated, all our tallying centres have been raided and the volunteers incarcerated. This is so unfair."

The whereabouts of the detainees seized during raids in Dar-es-Salaam were unknown by last evening.

ZANZIBAR POLLS

In Zanzibar, Seif Sharif Hamad, the candidate of the opposition Civic United Front (CUF), which is part of the Ukawa alliance, said he had received 200,077 votes against 178,363 for the incumbent CCM candidate, Dr Ali Mohamed Shein in what would be the first ever defeat for the ruling party in the island's presidential elections.

"We call on the (Zanzibar Electoral Commission) to declare the result without delay, and we call on Dr Shein to end any uncertainty and concede defeat," CUF said in a statement. "The longer the announcement is delayed the more room there is for those who will try to manipulate and change the outcome."

By 5pm, however, NEC was yet to announce full results from the islands and partial results still put the CCM candidate in the lead.

CUF lost narrowly to CCM in the 2010 election but the rival parties agreed on a power-sharing arrangement to avoid violence.

There was no official response to the declaration from the Zanzibar electoral officials but the head of NEC, Justice Damian Lubuva, called for patience as he delivered the second batch of official results in the afternoon.

NEC has promised to announce the final results by Thursday and the new President is scheduled to be sworn in on November 5.

Early results from the parliamentary elections suggested a tight contest between the two parties.

By 5pm, official results showed CCM and Chadema neck-and-neck having won 12 and nine seats respectively out of the 265-seat Parliament. Early exit interviews suggested that CCM, which had 186 of the 239 seats in the last Parliament, would win a smaller majority this time round.

After a polling day that was widely heralded for being peaceful, reports of skirmishes between supporters of the two main political parties started trickling in from different regions.

Police in Tandahimba, Mtwara Region in the southeast of the country, said they were holding eight people for allegedly invading and destroying the house of an election supervisor in Nanyamba Province.

In Tarime, northern Tanzania, a 36-year-old opposition supporter was stabbed to death in a dispute with a CCM supporter on Sunday night.

The election has been the most tightly contested since Tanzania returned to multiparty politics in 1992.

Supporters of the Civic United Front party gather outside the CUF headquarters in Zanzibar on October 26, 2015 at the party presidential candidate declared victory in the polls.

Tanzania: Slaa Slams Chadema on Lowassa

Chadema has lost credibility and public trust for accepting former Prime Minister Edward Lowassa who has incessantly been implicated in various corrupt practices, the opposition party's former Secretary General, Dr Willibrod Slaa, charged in Dar es Salaam.

Addressing reporters after weeks of "going underground" , Dr Slaa alleged that the party for which he had spent a number of years to build has turned into a hideout for corrupt leaders and rejects from CCM.

The former priest and opposition politics doyen claimed that he had personally and several colleagues sacrificed for CHADEMA even by suffering physical attacks and having their blood spilled in "our crusade to denounce corruption and state misconduct".

Dr Slaa added that surprisingly, the very party that he had sacrificed a lot to build has made a U-turn and is now 'cleansing an ill-mannered heavyweight' and declaring him its Union presidential candidate.

In a nearly 120-minute televised speech, the former clergyman pointed out that he was not ready to be part of the race, which has drown members from the bloc they have vehemently been accusing of corruption.

One of the things, which positioned the party and earned it credibility, according to Dr Slaa, was being in the frontline to fight against dishonesty and unethical behaviour in public offices.

"By accepting Lowassa, who was included in our list of shame, it is apparent that we can't walk the talk... we are now even worse than our competitor," he said, adding that he was not ready to be part of the dirty deal.

Dr Slaa, who also announced to have withdrawn his membership with the party, uncovered the secret behind his 'disappearance' that had left behind a lot of speculation, revealing that he disagreed to agree with top CHADEMA leaders on Lowassa.

He told his audience that before allowing the former premier to join the party, under his capacity as SG, he wanted Mr Lowassa to among others, announce publicly that he is defecting from CCM and also cleanse himself before the public. "I wanted him to publicly announce that he has ditched CCM.

I also directed that before accepting him, he was supposed to come out and clean himself from corruption allegations levelled against him," Dr Slaa stated, adding that to his surprise 'his directives were not heeded to'.

He alleged that when Mr Lowassa was planning to join the party, he had promised that there were about 50 MPs, 22 regional chairpersons and 88 district chairpersons who were set to cross over with him.

"I told my fellow party leaders... you know I am always sincere; before welcoming him we have to see if he is an asset or a liability," the former Karatu MP noted, adding that he also wanted Mr Lowassa to name all CCM cadres who would have defected with him.

According to him, he never received list of prominent CCM cadres who would have defected to Chadema with Lowassa. Dr Slaa went on saying that after learning that his party had started to go off the track, he decided to leave, adding that he was not ready to see what he stood up for being changed for individual interests.

He cautioned the public to be able to distinguish between matters of national interests and those falling under individual interest.

"National interest must be measured by objective criteria and not just by empty words... these people are indoctrinating propaganda only to sway the public, they are kind of leaders that if given power will only drive this country to a wrong destination," he expounded.

Dr Slaa said that to people who are prejudiced would think that he was out to attack CHADEMA, but the fact was that 'truth is only one and indivisible.'

He also termed as malicious, misleading and cheap politics, remarks made by the party's National Chairman, Mr Freeman Mbowe, to the effect that he was on short leave and would later join the party.

"I stood firm from the first minute, when they fail to agree with me, I quit... being two-faced is very dangerous, electing such people is even more dangerous," he pointed out, asking voters to be extra careful when electing their leaders.

Dr Slaa also poked fun at clerics who have reportedly been bribed to support Mr Lowassa in his aspiration to become Union president, saying it was high time they knelt down and pray.

He strongly condemned what he alleged as "frequent remarks by CHADEMA that they were even ready to team up with Satan to drive out CCM, insisting that the ruling party cannot be overpowered without a serious programme and a serious people.

The former CHADEMA leader told the gathering that he had resigned from his post as SG since "the very first day we disagreed in the Central Committee meeting", adding that he has officially and effectively resigned from CHADEMA and active politics.

Former Tanzania Prime Minister Joins Opposition Party

Tanzania's opposition coalition Ukawa has officially welcomed former Prime Minister Edward Lowassa into its ranks in a plan to reinforce their efforts to defeat the ruling party CCM in the October presidential elections.

In a strange turn of events, the coalition came out to defend Mr Lowassa at a press conference on Monday, terming him a person of integrity and claiming that there was no evidence linking him to corruption allegations.

They further said that they believed Mr Lowassa would have been prosecuted if the allegations against him were true.