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What is wrong with ‘No Reform, No Election’?
Chadema national chairman, Tundu Lissu. PHOTO | COURTESY
What you need to know:
- Tanzanians, we are better than that: we all agree that we want elections that empower the people; we all want ballots that count, not charades; we all want leadership chosen through fair competition, not manufactured results. These are the barest essentials of democracy that no patriotic Tanzanian can dismiss.
I cast my first vote in 2000. A few months earlier, I had finished my A-levels and returned to a Bible college somewhere in Arusha, to complete a diploma program I’d begun years before.
There were no buses, so that Sunday morning, I walked six kilometres to the main road, boarded a kifodi to Kijenge, and proudly cast my ballot. Voting felt sacred—a civic duty I was determined to fulfil.
When I arrived back at college, I was stunned to learn that many of my mates, pastors, and even a few bishops hadn’t voted. How could they be so careless about a duty so sacred? I talked to them – many of them believed that their votes wouldn’t count.
I am reminded of that experience today as the country is divided between those ready to vote and those who don’t. Once this seemed a somewhat distant debate between CCM and Chadema, and I could stand aside and observe how it was playing out.
But it has since become urgent. Tundu Lissu is now in jail. Dozens of Chadema activists have quit in protest. Mdude Nyagali has disappeared. Father Kitima was attacked. Bishop Bagonza faces threats. This is no abstract quarrel—it is a national crisis.
So, let’s start with principles.
Our constitution, ragged as it is, guarantees Tanzanians basic rights: to speak, to vote, to lead. These are not gifts but rights—inalienable and universal. Rights are dual in nature. Free speech includes the freedom not to speak. The right to lead includes the right to decline office. Voting allows abstention. Since 2000, I’ve never missed an election. But 40 million Tanzanians have—many due to a collective rejection of a system they see as rigged.
When Tanzania embraced multiparty democracy in 1995, 77 percent of registered voters turned out. By 2020, the electorate had swelled from nine million to nearly thirty million, but turnout collapsed: abstention more than doubled from 23 percent in 1995 to 50 percent in 2020.
In effect, half our nation has already been saying “no election” through non-participation.
So why the panic now that Chadema has organised mass abstention as a protest? Is it because they’ve given form to a choice millions have already made individually? Or are we unsettled by their unity, shifting this from a private decision into a public movement?
The strategy isn’t new. It is a deliberate, non-violent tactic—Gandhi boycotted British-run elections in 1920 and 1934, using abstention to fracture colonial legitimacy.
His satyagraha wasn’t about rejecting democracy but demanding it. Similarly, Martin Luther King Jr. didn’t march in Selma to destroy elections—he sought to redeem them, exposing racist barriers like literacy tests and poll taxes.
His protests forced America to pass the Voting Rights Act, a law that expanded democracy by dismantling exclusion.
Today’s critics demand equally sensible safeguards: an independent electoral commission, transparent candidate registration, unfettered assembly and media access, and accountability for intimidation or disappearances.
These are not radical demands: you cannot allow Yanga executives to appoint referees for their matches against Simba, or vice versa, and expect the matches to be fair. We should remember that the critics’ point of view has often been validated by many stakeholders. The High Court’s ruling against ministerial oversight of elections.
The African Court of Human Rights ruling. The 2014 Constitutional Review Commission’s proposals. The Nyalali Commission proposals. The TEC communique. So, these are not new calls. When half the electorate abstains, ignoring these calls only cements elections as hollow performances.
The purpose of elections isn’t to entrench rulers but to empower citizens. It is one thing to mobilise all security forces in rejection of democracy—it is another thing to demand it. Gandhi’s boycotts forced Britain to the negotiating table. King’s marches turned Selma’s Edmund Pettus Bridge into a global symbol of justice. In each case, resistance saved democracy.
So here is our plea: let us restore the basic safeguards that underpin every genuine democratic process. Independent oversight will ensure that votes are counted fairly.
Transparent candidate vetting will prevent arbitrary disqualifications. Free media and open assemblies will guarantee that ideas, not intimidation, decide outcomes. And full accountability for abuses will protect voters’ physical safety.
When Gandhi faced British repression, when King overcame entrenched racism, and when TANU dismantled colonial power, they did so without violence. They did this by exercising their rights to refuse to legitimise a broken system.I usually argue that when you block all non-violent means to change, you end up with only violent means.
Tanzanians, we are better than that: we all agree that we want elections that empower the people; we all want ballots that count, not charades; we all want leadership chosen through fair competition, not manufactured results. These are the barest essentials of democracy that no patriotic Tanzanian can dismiss.
So, why are we dragging our feet?
