Dar es Salaam. Opposition parties CHADEMA and ACT Wazalendo said Thursday that Angolan authorities reportedly blocked their respective delegations from entering the southern African nation where Tanzanian opposition leaders were attending a conference on democracy.
The Tanzanian opposition leaders went to Angola ostensibly on the invitation from the Brenthurst Foundation, a South Africa-based NGO that works to promote democracy and good governance in Africa, to attend the Platform for African Democrats (PAD) Forum, scheduled to take place from March 15 to March 16, 2025.
The ACT Wazalendo delegation included party leader Dorothy Semu as well as the party’s national chairperson Othman Masoud Othman, who doubles as the First Vice President in the ruling Government of National Unity in Zanzibar. CHADEMA was to be represented by its national chairperson, Tundu Lissu.
However, the two delegations were stopped at the Luanda Airport from entering Angola, with ACT Wazalendo reporting that no specific reasons were provided for such an inconvenience.
“The leaders are currently being held at the Luanda Airport, and their passports have been confiscated,” the party said in a statement posted on its official X account.
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“The Angolan government, without providing any explanation, has issued an order for them to be returned to Tanzania via Ethiopia and Johannesburg, according to the connection flight,” the statement added.
The party “strongly” condemned the “degrading treatment” against its leaders, and “demanded explanation” from the Angolan Ambassador to Tanzania regarding the ordeal.
“We call upon Tanzania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation to summon and question the Angolan Ambassador to Tanzania regarding this incident,” ACT Wazalendo added in its statement.
According to reports, the Tanzanian opposition leaders were not alone in experiencing the inconvenience. More than 40 other leaders from various African countries, who were scheduled to attend the conference, were denied entry to Angola by the country’s immigration authorities.
These include former President of Botswana; a former Prime Minister of Lesotho and a host of senior political leaders and delegates from Kenya, Sudan, Tanzania, South Africa, Namibia, Eswatini, Lesotho, Germany, USA, Uganda, DRC and Mozambique.
In an X post, Mr Lissu condemned the treatment, writing: “This shabby treatment of the nationals of brotherly African nations by the Angolan immigration authorities is totally unacceptable and should be condemned in the strongest possible terms.”
Neither Angolan authorities nor the Brenthurst Foundation had commented about the matter by the time we published this story.
“Angolans and Tanzanians are a brotherly people,” Lissu added in his statement. “Tanzania hosted Dr Antonio Agostinho Neto and his MPLA fighters in the early years of their independence struggle. We supported Angola through thick and thin during the apartheid South African regime’s occupation of Southern Angola in the ’70s and ’80s.”
One Response
Tundu says “We supported Angola through thick and thin during the apartheid South African regime’s occupation of Southern Angola in the ’70s and ’80s.”
Yes but at that time UNITA of Angola sided with the South African apartheid regime. Now they are organizing this international seminar on democracy !!