"Tanzania's internet restrictions during election are 'despicable,' digital rights activist says"

Tanzania has a history of free and fair elections, but now, as voters head to the polls to elect their next president, it's not so clear... Berhan Taye, the Africa policy manager at Access Now, a nonprofit digital rights organization, has been following the situation closely from Nairobi, Kenya...

[He says..."] for the past two days, we've seen social media platforms being blocked, particularly WhatsApp, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, to a certain extent. Numerous websites that are reporting on election fraud or election events are being blocked, numerous media websites are being blocked, as well — and attempts by the government to slow down internet connection, as well, were some of the things that we've seen in the past few days... There were numerous targetings of activists, journalists, opposition groups — not just physical attacks, but also online attacks. We've seen so many attempts to take down certain websites, to take down certain Twitter accounts that are not in line with the government's narrative. So, the government is desperately, desperately trying to control information flow and censor...

But ... now, if you look at the African continent, there have been numerous internet shutdowns during just even this year in Togo, Guinea, as you said, Burundi, and many more countries have shut down the internet. One thing that's really concerning here is that the internet is, in many ways, the tool that opposition groups, activists, journalists have to source information, to be able to express themselves and campaign.