Tanzania's opposition leader freed from jail

Tanzania's opposition leader Freeman Mbowe was released from jail on Friday, after paying a fine following his conviction alongside other opposition figures and lawmakers on charges related to a banned demonstration.

Mbowe and seven other opposition MPs and officials -- some released on Thursday -- were freed after the party raised most of the 350 million shillings ($152,000) in penalties required.

The demonstration had been banned by President John Magufuli's government, which has been accused of crushing dissent, jailing critics and passing draconian laws that weaken basic freedoms in Tanzania.

"Our chairman Freeman Mbowe is now free. People's power has finally opened the gates of prisons. Congratulations to Tanzanians," the opposition party Chadema wrote on Twitter.

A Dar es Salaam court on Tuesday ordered the eight Chadema officials and a fellow co-accused to pay a fine or serve five months in prison on what the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee slammed as "spurious charges".

On its Twitter account the committee said the case was "more evidence of deteriorating political space and freedoms in Tanzania."

Mbowe and the others were charged in 2018 with sedition, unlawful assembly and inciting violence, among other offences, over a rally in which police fired live rounds to disperse Chadema supporters demanding accreditation in a local election.

A 22-year-old student who was not taking part was shot dead by a stray bullet from police.

Some of the charges were linked to a speech Mbowe gave during the demonstration in which he said Magufuli would not last long in his job.

The strongman leader, who was elected in 2015, is expected to run for another term later this year in a country once seen as a bastion of democracy in a tumultuous part of Africa.

Magufuli took office as a corruption-fighting "man of the people" but has been criticised for his authoritarian leadership style.

In September 2017, lawmaker Tundu Lissu, a member of Chadema, was shot and seriously injured at his home.

The following year two local Chadema officials were killed by unknown gunmen, in murders described by the opposition as political assassinations.