*Event date: 2025-05-18*
Kenyan politician Martha Karua says she was expelled from Tanzania after travelling to Dar es Salaam to observe the trial of opposition leader Tundu Lissu, a case that has become a new test of political rights in East Africa. France 24 reported that Karua and members of her group were stopped on arrival at Julius Nyerere International Airport and put on a flight out the same day.
Karua, a former justice minister and presidential candidate in Kenya, said she went to Tanzania in solidarity with Lissu, whom she represents legally. Lissu faces treason charges that could carry the death penalty. His Chadema party has already been disqualified from the October elections after refusing to sign an electoral code of conduct and demanding reforms. Karua said the authorities' treatment of her group suggested they would not give Lissu a fair trial.
The deportation also fits a wider pattern of tightening political space in the region, according to Karua and rights advocates. She told AFP that Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda were all experiencing a "total erosion of democratic principles" and that governments were becoming dangerous not just to opponents but to their own citizens. In Tanzania, she argued, the ruling party was trying to clear the field before the vote by locking up or sidelining the main challengers.
The report notes that Karua is also positioning herself for Kenya's 2027 presidential election, making her a prominent regional opposition figure rather than a single-issue campaigner. Her People's Liberation Party condemned the deportation, calling it an affront to dignity and freedom and a breach of East African Community principles. That response is important because the dispute is no longer just about one legal visit; it has become a public signal of how opposition figures are treated when they cross borders in the region.
Karua has also been involved in other high-profile legal and political disputes. France 24 said she has been representing Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye, who was kidnapped in Kenya last year and taken back to Uganda for trial on treason charges. That wider work helps explain why her presence in Dar es Salaam mattered: she is not simply a Kenyan politician visiting a neighbouring state, but a regional opposition lawyer challenging governments she says are sliding toward repression.
The Tanzanian authorities have not, in the AFP excerpt, offered a detailed public explanation for the deportation beyond the action itself. What is clear is that the episode unfolded against the backdrop of a contentious trial, an approaching election and a broader crackdown argument being made by opposition figures across East Africa. Lissu remains a central opposition figure in Tanzania, while Karua has become one of the most visible cross-border critics of the region's ruling parties.
For now, the immediate consequence is simple: Karua says she was deported, her party says the move was unlawful, and the case she had travelled to observe is set to continue under intense political scrutiny.
