Sixty-one people arrested in early July in Tanzania for calling for or taking part in planned protests have been charged with “terrorism”, the opposition party Chadema said on Monday.
Around 70 other people arrested during the same period are still in police custody and waiting to be charged, it said.
On July 9, two days after a foiled demonstration, the police said they had arrested 130 people suspected of planning criminal acts or inciting them by sharing messages related to the protest.
“Sixty-one people have been charged with terrorism until today and most of them are our members,” Chadema’s lawyer Rugemeleza Nshala told reporters.
“Chadema is not supporting terrorism at all… Participating or attempting to take part in demonstrations is not terrorism,” he said.
