Tanzania's Lissu Verdict: Treason Cleared, Four Years Jailed

Tanzania's High Court acquitted opposition leader Tundu Lissu of treason on Friday, November 6, and sentenced him to four years in prison for incitement, ending a trial that had kept him in detention for 577 days. The Lissu verdict spared the chairman of the Chadema party a possible death sentence while keeping him behind bars.

A panel of judges in Dar es Salaam, led by Justice Dunstan Ndunguru, ruled that prosecutors had failed to prove a central element of the treason charge: that Lissu intended to intimidate the government. The judges found instead that his campaign slogan, "No Reforms, No Election", amounted to incitement to disrupt the general election held last October. "By uttering those words with the intention of disseminating them to the public, the accused incited the public to disrupt the 2025 elections," the court ruled, according to reports from the hearing.

Lissu was taken back to Ukonga Prison after the ruling. The court granted him leave to appeal to the Court of Appeal, Tanzania's highest court, and his party said it would challenge the conviction and seek bail while the appeal proceeds.

The case against Lissu

Lissu, 58, was arrested on 9 April last year after addressing a rally in Mbinga, in the Ruvuma region, and charged with treason the next day, according to the Associated Press. The case rested on remarks he made at a rally at Chadema headquarters on 3 April last year, when the party was campaigning for electoral and constitutional reforms ahead of the vote.

Prosecutors argued that his statements urged supporters to prevent and disrupt the election. The judges agreed that the remarks amounted to incitement, but said the prosecution had not shown the intent to intimidate the government that a treason conviction required. Treason carries the death penalty under Tanzanian law.

The panel relied on Section 319 of the Criminal Procedure Act, which allows a court to convict an accused person of a lesser offence where the evidence supports it, and applied it to incitement under Section 390 of the Penal Code. The judges said the way witnesses interpreted his remarks was not enough to establish the intent treason required, according to The Chanzo, an independent Tanzanian outlet that covered the trial.

It was the third high-profile treason trial in mainland Tanzania's history. Lissu denied the charges throughout, maintaining that his statements were part of a legitimate campaign for reform. His arrest came in the run-up to the presidential vote last October, when the government detained a string of opponents and critics.

Reaction and what comes next

Lissu rejected the outcome in court, calling the treason charge "a political fabrication" and describing the trial as "political persecution". He accused the judges of following orders from the government of President Samia Suluhu Hassan. In a statement after the ruling, he said the court had confirmed that the treason charge could not be proved.

Amnesty International condemned the conviction and the prison term, calling the verdict the result of a "deeply flawed and unfair judicial process". The organisation said Lissu had spent more than 18 months in detention for peacefully exercising his rights and demanded his immediate release.

Chadema said it would appeal the conviction and seek bail for Lissu pending the outcome. Chadema spokesperson Brenda Rupia told Reuters that he plans to appeal, and the Pan-African Solidarity Network also demanded his release and called for an independent international investigation into alleged human rights violations during and after the election.

The term sits near the heavy end of the range for incitement, which carries a maximum of five years. According to The Chanzo, the sentencing pronouncement did not say how his time in custody would count toward the term, a question the appeal may have to settle.

Why the split verdict matters

The acquittal removes the gravest threat Lissu faced, but the conviction keeps Tanzania's most prominent opposition figure in prison while his party prepares an appeal. The court's use of the lesser-offence rule to substitute an incitement conviction for the treason charge is now the central legal question, and the Court of Appeal will decide whether that substitution was sound.

The case also leaves a wider question open for Tanzania's opposition. Chadema campaigned under a slogan that called for electoral reforms before any vote, and the court has now ruled that the slogan itself amounted to incitement. How the appeal court treats that finding will shape what opposition parties can say in public during the next campaign.

For now, Lissu remains in prison. His lawyers say they plan an appeal and a bail application, and neither outcome is known. The verdict closes a trial that lasted about 19 months, but the legal fight over it is only beginning.

The Tanzania ruling landed in a week of fast-moving political news. In Paraguay, President Santiago Peña offered his resignation after the collapse of digital lender ueno, and in Israel the election count gave Gadi Eisenkot 67 endorsements to form a government, against 46 for Benjamin Netanyahu.

Sources: Associated Press, People Daily, Jamaica Inquirer.