By Adonis Byemelwa
In a moment that was both sobering and stirring, President Samia Suluhu Hassan, who also serves as the Chairperson of Tanzania’s ruling party Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM), took to the podium at the Jakaya Kikwete Conference Centre in Dodoma to deliver her closing remarks during CCM’s Special Conference on May 30, 2025.
Her speech wasn’t just political protocol—it struck deep chords across the country. She called for integrity and transparency in the vetting process for party leadership candidates, making it unequivocally clear: “CCM must not become a haven for power-hungry opportunists lacking vision and moral compass.”
With deliberate firmness, she declared, “Let’s not allow those merely seeking inclusion for selfish ambition to sneak through. If we let them in, we risk turning CCM into a caricature of itself. Let’s not Gwajimanize our party. Leave Magwajima outside.”
The name-drop was no accident. It came just days after a bombshell press conference by Kawe MP and firebrand preacher Josephat Gwajima, whose biting critique of the government’s silence on politically charged abductions sent shockwaves nationwide.
Gwajima—known for his larger-than-life promises and erratic political theater—has now found a rare moment of resonance with the Tanzanian public.
This time, he wasn’t talking about flying pregnant women in helicopters or bringing Japanese fishing vessels to Kawe. He was asking uncomfortable but essential questions: Who is behind the disappearances? Why does silence shroud these tragedies?
Bishop Gwajima had recently opposed COVID-19 vaccinations, defying President Samia’s public health push. Photo: Courtesy
Despite Gwajima’s colorful political history—peppered with broken promises and borderline mythical campaign pledges—his latest stance is being taken seriously. Social media erupted with impassioned commentary, painting a landscape that President Samia may not have anticipated.
From Arusha to Zanzibar, across Twitter (now X), Facebook, and TikTok, the backlash against the President’s comments has been blistering. Critics are not mincing words. Influential voices like Rehema Mdee, political analyst Neema Mahenge, and activist Nuru Mjema have slammed the President’s swipe at Gwajima as tone-deaf and dangerous.
“The President is gaslighting us,” wrote former MP Godbless Lema in a viral thread. “Where was she when people like Ben Saanane, Azory Gwanda, and Akwilina disappeared or died under suspicious circumstances? You can’t silence Gwajima now just because he’s speaking what the people are whispering.”
Journalist Jamila Rwekaza commented, “We don’t have to like Gwajima to agree with him. He is finally reflecting the anguish that Tanzanians have bottled up for years.”
Sentiments like these aren’t isolated. According to trending online polls and street interviews picked up by local citizen journalists, over 90% of Tanzanians now voice support for Gwajima’s call for accountability. In contrast, the President’s remarks, especially the now-mocked phrase “Tusigwajimanise Chama chetu,” have been ridiculed as an elitist jab that misses the national mood.
Supporters of the President—few and notably quiet—include party loyalists such as CCM Youth Wing chair Mussa Mwaikenda and veteran political commentator Bashiru Ally, who defended Samia’s speech as a bold stand for party discipline. But their voices feel drowned out in a wave of public sentiment that reads like a referendum on deeper, unresolved traumas.
For many Tanzanians, especially the families of the disappeared, Gwajima’s defiance is not just political—it’s personal. It has become an emotional stand-in for years of unspoken pain. Parents of the missing speak with cautious hope, wondering if perhaps now, someone with a platform is finally saying what they’ve screamed into the void.
Yet, there’s undeniable irony in this political shift. For years, Gwajima himself remained noticeably silent during past waves of politically linked violence. His previous antics—ranging from fantastical promises to controversial religious declarations—made him the butt of jokes rather than a voice of conscience.
The question now hanging in the air is whether this newfound moral clarity is genuine or simply another performance, calculated for the upcoming general election.
Still, even the cynics are watching. Something about his recent tone feels different—less theatrical, more urgent. Whether driven by conviction or political calculus, Gwajima has tapped into a collective fatigue that CCM’s leadership, including President Samia, seems to have underestimated.
International observers are beginning to take note, too. Human rights groups and foreign media, including BBC Africa and Human Rights Watch, are tracking the unfolding tension within CCM and the growing discontent with what many see as authoritarian leanings masked as party discipline.
If the backlash continues to build, it may signal more than just a rift within Tanzania’s ruling party. It could mark a turning point in the nation’s reckoning with its democratic promise and the ghosts of its unresolved past.
In the end, what Tanzania witnessed this week was not just a political spat—it was a clash of truths. One uttered from a presidential podium with the weight of power, the other shouted from the pulpit of populism, echoing through the alleys of digital discourse.
And somewhere in that echo, the people have spoken. Whether they’ve chosen the preacher over the President remains to be seen, but one thing is clear—this election season, silence will no longer be an option.
For Gwajima, the path ahead within CCM is anything but certain. Once a flamboyant ally, now a quasi-dissident within party lines, he walks a fine line between political relevance and forced isolation.
Inside CCM’s tightly controlled machinery, no open arms are waiting for him—just wary glances and strategic silences. Only Luhaga Mpina, the MP from Kisesa, has dared to publicly back Gwajima, offering a lone voice of solidarity in an increasingly cold room.
The rest of the party has either dismissed him with condescension or clung tighter to the party script, citing loyalty over logic. There's a palpable discomfort around him now—he’s still in the room, but everyone seems to be speaking around him, not to him.
That isolation doesn’t come without risks. His safety, though not publicly threatened, is now a quiet concern whispered among his supporters. The same security apparatus he’s criticizing is the one meant to protect him.
His boldness may have lit a fire in the hearts of ordinary citizens, but it’s also placed a target on his back in circles that prefer compliance over confrontation. Whether he's navigating corridors of Parliament or stepping onto a church pulpit, there’s a new tension in the air—part courage, part caution. He belongs to CCM, technically, but politically, he’s in a no-man’ land. Not quite outside the system, but not truly within it anymore.
So, what should politics be, if not a space where uncomfortable truths can be spoken aloud? What use is loyalty if it silences those truths? The political philosopher Hannah Arendt once argued that truth in politics is always fragile, not because it isn’t real, but because power seeks to manage it. And yet, the vitality of a democracy is measured not by how well it rewards obedience, but by how it tolerates dissent.
In this moment, Gwajima isn’t just a politician; he’s become a test. A test of whether Tanzania’s ruling party can evolve to accommodate internal reckoning—or whether it will reject truth-tellers like splinters, inconvenient and painful.
The theory of “correspondence truth,” the idea that truth aligns with reality, comes into sharp relief here. If the disappearances are real, if the silence is real, and if the pain of the people is real, then truth must be allowed to correspond with those realities—however politically uncomfortable they may be.
In the weeks ahead, Tanzania will not just be watching elections unfold—it will be watching itself, in a mirror held up by one of its most unlikely prophets. And maybe, just maybe, that reflection will be too honest to ignore.
