Here is the full transcript of human rights advocate Fatma Karume’s talk titled “How to Fight for Democracy in the Shadow of Autocracy” at TED 2024 conference.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
The two most commonly used words to describe Tanzania until 2016 were “peaceful” and “poor.” From 1992, when Tanzania transformed from a single-party autocracy to a multi-party democracy, we became known as a “transitioning democracy with a lot of potential.” That is a polite euphemism for an authoritarian state that does not commit atrocities against its people and allows a modicum of controlled opposition. I was born in Zanzibar, Tanzania, and in the late 1990s I became a corporate litigator.
By 2007, I was successful and had reported cases under my belt. I knew that a transitioning democracy is nothing more than camouflage. So along with my practice, I had a weekly unpaid column in a daily English paper in which I espoused the importance of democracy, rule of law, human rights and freedoms.
The Rise of John Pombe Magufuli
I was chugging along nicely, raising a family, working hard and contributing to public awareness. Until late 2015, when a man named John Pombe Magufuli, also known as “the bulldozer,” became president. Under him, Tanzania reverted to full-blown autocracy.
My anxiety spiked knowing that my life, and that of many others in Tanzania, was about to be turned upside-down. My peaceful daily life quickly turned into horror. Every day for four years, from 2017 to 2021, I lived a personal nightmare which was played out on the public arena.
Personal Trials and Tribulations
My office was bombed, a client and friend was shot 16 times, friends and colleagues were arrested and imprisoned without due process, others disappeared, some were maimed. And I became the target of a state-sponsored, press smear campaign.
And the state eventually unlawfully disbarred me from practicing my profession.
My self-image had become so enmeshed with my profession that I didn’t recognize myself anymore. I had to rediscover who I was. But what kept me going through those four years was one, knowing that my belief in agency and free will for the people of Tanzania was echoed by millions of others.
Secondly, I found community in the alliances I made with people who had also found their voices and were willing to fight for democracy, a community that became my safe space. And lastly, autocracies fail. It is what history has taught us.
The Promise of Wealth and the End of Corruption
I reminded myself every day that I was on the right side of history, and the autocracy in Tanzania would fail and democracy would prevail. So here’s how it all started in 2015. President Magufuli promised Tanzanians wealth and the end to corruption in exchange for democracy.
He claimed it was too messy. Too many voices to contend with, and this would lead to too many compromises, and wealth in the form of development would suffer. As for corruption, “the bulldozer” told us that rule of law was too slow.
Corruption could only be dealt with by a messianic character like himself, who could mete out justice quickly and effectively. The association Transparency International rates the police and the judiciary amongst the two most corrupt institutions in Tanzania. So in a country where the GDP per capita is less than 800 American dollars per annum and corruption is a daily experience for the average person, giving up an abstract concept like democracy for the promise of wealth and a corruption-free society is a very attractive proposition.
The Importance of Democracy
Very few realize that this abstract concept holds within it our agency, our free will, the very essence of our humanity. In early 2016, my weekly column on the importance of democracy was canceled. That was extremely frustrating, and I let my editor know how much in no uncertain terms.
After a heated debate, the editor admitted that the survival of the paper depended on him making some concessions, including cutting my views out of the publication. I felt like I had been robbed of my agency. My editor also asked me to self-censor and warned me that if I did not, the state would retaliate by creating fear, alienating me from family and friends and destabilizing me financially.
The Campaign of Fear
By late 2016, the public campaign of fear had begun. Bodies wrapped in gunny sacks would wash up on our pristine beaches. Journalists and businessmen would disappear without a trace.
Police would snatch and grab journalists, human rights activists, lawyers, opposition politicians and keep them incommunicado. The country was consumed by fear. In June 2017, I dared to lift my head above the parapet, and I represented Tundu Lissu, an opposition politician and also the president of the Bar Association of Tanganyika Law Society, who had been arrested and held incommunicado for more than one week.
His crime? He called Magufuli a “petty dictator.” He was finally released on bail in July. It was then, about a month later, at 2am on August 26, that my office building was bombed.
Personal Attacks and Isolation
The campaign of fear had become personal. And no one has ever been charged for that offense. I recall the fear in my colleague’s eyes as they asked me to self-censor.
Association with me had become dangerous, and I started to lose friends. It was very lonely. Then on September 7, 2017, Tundu Lissu was shot 16 times with a submachine gun in broad daylight outside his home. He survived this murderous attempt, and no one has been charged. Like the rest of the country, on the afternoon of the shooting, I was in disbelief. And fear gripped me.
Fighting Back
You know, fear can either cripple you into inaction or spur you to fight. I consider myself lucky. Fear spurs me to fight.
So I began to fight back. I looked for a way to continue to advocate for democracy, rule of law and human rights on a platform outside the reach of the state: Twitter. In January 2018, I joined Twitter where I started publishing my thoughts on democracy, rule of law and human rights in Kiswahili.
In very little time, I had a million followers and was known as Shangazi wa Taifa, which in Swahili means the aunt of the nation. I had regained my voice on my terms. No one could censor me, so I believed.
Online Harassment and Censorship
But then, the state machinery used trolls to insult my family and me and threaten my life. It was frightening because I couldn’t tell when the internet violence would spill into the real world. But I kept going.
I made connections with other Tanzanian Twitter influencers who were fighting for democracy. We were a small group, but we bonded on and offline, and there was power in our conviction and in our message. We created an online democratic space which we called Twitter Republic.
To shut us down, the state spent millions of dollars — and this is a poor country — to block access to Twitter. We installed free VPNs, encouraged others to do the same, and continued tweeting relentlessly. In March 2018, I decided to run for the presidency of the Tanganyika Law Society to keep fighting for rule of law and democracy.
Advocacy and Censorship
I was elected as the second female president of the society and used my position to advocate for democracy, rule of law. The question most people ask is: Were you not scared? I was petrified, and when I was driving, I used my rear-view mirror and my side-view mirror a lot more than necessary to see who might be following me.
But my belief in agency and free will outweighed my fear of the autocratic government. The Tanzanian judiciary has a tradition of inviting the president of the Law Society to speak at Law Day. In February 2019, during Law Day, the judiciary informed me that there was no time for my speech. After they had scrutinized it. Again, someone, somewhere was attempting to censor me. The entire Governing Council of the bar boycotted Law Day 2019.
Regaining Autonomy and Sharing the Truth
I made a recording of my speech in Kiswahili and posted it online. It was about the judiciary’s role and failure to promote rule of law. It went viral.
I had once again regained my autonomy and my ability to share the truth. Not sufficiently satisfied with my presence on Twitter, I, along with a group of concerned citizens, decided to bring our activism to court. In 2018, we commenced a slew of cases against the president and his government for breaching our constitution.
We also made sure that the cases were fought out in the court of public opinion, if only to educate. In early 2019, the judge presiding over one of these cases suspended me from practicing indefinitely, without giving me a right to be heard. By September 2020, as I mentioned, I was permanently disbarred.
Personal Sacrifices and Convictions
The reasons don’t matter. Suffice it to say that in Tanzania, the bar is not independent, and we’re disciplined by a judge sitting in a panel with the director of public prosecution, and both of them are presidential appointees. I lost my right to earn a living.
My partners and people I had considered friends promptly fired me from a law firm I had helped build. The government had achieved its goal. I was friendless and finance-less.
This fight wasn’t without tremendous personal cost, but I still had my children, my parents and my siblings, and I made new friends. But they were all at risk, and I worried about them every day. I couldn’t stop though, I realized that so long as I was living in an autocracy, I didn’t have a career anyway.
The Death of Magufuli and the Future of Tanzania
There is no rule of law in an autocracy, and lawyers are only relevant where there is respect for the rule of law. Worse still, I would lose my agency and free will. And I confidently said to myself, in any event, I’m on the right side of history.
It wasn’t long before I did find out how right I was. In March 2021, Magufuli was pronounced dead. He was a COVID denier, and the state denies he died from COVID.
But, you know, public consensus disagrees with the state. His death marked the end of a terrifying era of hatred and darkness under a fearful autocracy. I don’t want you to believe that there is a fairytale ending and that everything is good in Tanzania.
Tanzania at a Crossroads
What I can tell you is that we have reverted to a “transitioning democracy with a lot of potential.” Presidential commissions now invite me to give my opinions on establishment, on rule of law and the need for constitutional reform. Tanzania is presently at a crossroad.
We can either remain a transitioning democracy, proceed to become a working democracy or revert to a murderous autocracy. This depends entirely on whether enough people can stand up for democracy. So if there’s one thing you can take home from this, it’s this.
If you live in a full-fledged democracy, please don’t sit back. We need you to keep your country democratic. If, like me, you’re living in a “transitioning democracy,” it’s a good and safe place to fight for democracy, because transitioning democracies can easily revert into full-fledged autocracy, where fighting for democracy becomes a lot riskier.
And if you’re living in an autocracy, you can still fight. But it’s better if you aren’t fighting alone. Find your people so you can look out for each other and stay safe.