The Reception of Covid-19 Denialist Propaganda in Tanzania

Abstract

In June 2020, the government of Tanzania declared that Covid-19 had been eradicated from the country. As the figures released by Tanzania’s Ministry of Health since March 2021 show, this was not true. Taking this claim as an example of authoritarian propaganda, this article tackles the issue of ‘reception’ by asking if Tanzanians believed the government. Data from a nationally representative survey conducted close to the 2020 general elections suggest that one-third of respondents did believe the government’s declaration that Covid-19 had been eradicated from the country, although the government’s prior and less audacious claim – that the number of cases was declining – appears to have been more persuasive. The article also presents other evidence regarding the behaviour of Tanzanians during this period, which is consistent with these findings, before discussing why some Tanzanians bought into the government’s propaganda while others did not. The article concludes by arguing that the Tanzanian case shows that propaganda that may appear implausible to some audiences may be far more credible to others.

Keywords:

• Covid-19
• propaganda
• authoritarianism
• Tanzania
• Magufuli

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Denis Konga for research assistance and Jean-Benoît Falisse for commenting on an early draft and his support in creating the two figures. They are also thankful for the contributions to survey design from Mychelle Balthazard, Jean-François Daoust, Jean-Benoît Falisse, Paul Nugent and Patrick Vinck, and the comments from the three anonymous reviewers. The research on which this article was based was funded by the Global Challenges Research Fund and the Newton Fund (EP/V028464/1).

Notes

1 The SARS-CoV-2 virus causes the infectious disease known as coronavirus disease (Covid-19). Covid-19 is short for ‘coronavirus disease 2019’, which WHO first learned of on 31 December 2019. World Health Organization (WHO), ‘Coronavirus disease (Covid-19)’, available at https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/coronavirus-disease-covid-19, retrieved 9 December 2023; WHO, ‘Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Situation Report 22’, available at https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situation-reports/20200211-sitrep-22-ncov.pdf, retrieved 9 December 2023.

2 ‘Covid-19: Magufuli Must Stop Burying His Head in the Sand’, The Star, Nairobi, 22 February 2021, available at https://www.the-star.co.ke/opinion/leader/2021-02-22-covid-19-magufuli-must-stop-burying-his-head-in-the-sand/, retrieved 24 February 2021; J. Devermont and M. Harris, ‘Implications of Tanzania’s Bungled Response to Covid-19’, CSIS, Washington DC, 26 May 2020, available at https://www.csis.org/analysis/implications-tanzanias-bungled-response-covid-19, retrieved 30 May 2020; L. Chutel, ‘Africa’s Covid-19 Denialist-in-Chief’, Foreign Policy, Washington DC, 17 February 2021, available at https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/02/17/tanzania-president-magufuli-coronavirus-pandemic-denial/, retrieved 25 February 2021.

3 ‘Tanzania President Magufuli Says Hospital Numbers Reducing’, BBC, London, 17 May 2020, available at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-52697508, retrieved 19 May 2020.

4 ‘John Magufuli Declares Tanzania Free of Covid-19’, BBC, 8 June 2020, available at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-52966016, retrieved 19 July 2020.

5 B. Taylor, ‘Omicron Wave Reaches Tanzania’, Tanzanian Affairs, London, 1 January 2022, available at https://www.tzaffairs.org/2022/01/health-coronavirus/, retrieved 9 January 2022; United Republic of Tanzania Ministry of Health, ‘Covid-19 Situation Report #27’, available at https://www.moh.go.tz/storage/app/uploads/public/623/bf6/9a3/623bf69a3d819268181372.pdf, retrieved 6 July 2022.

6 This was part of a broader UKRI-funded research project (Grant Number: EP/V028464/1) on African elections during the Covid-19 pandemic, which also involves case studies of the Central African Republic and Ghana. Available at https://aecp.sps.ed.ac.uk/, retrieved 9 December 2023.

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8 M. Hassan, D. Mattingly and E.R. Nugent, ‘Political Control’, Annual Review of Political Science, 25, 1 (May 2022), pp. 155–74.

9 Ibid., p. 161.

10 D. Mattingly and E. Yao, ‘How Soft Propaganda Persuades’, Comparative Political Studies, 55, 9 (2022), p. 1570.

11 See, for example, M. Edel and M. Josua, ‘How Authoritarian Rules Seek to Legitimize Repression: Framing Mass Killings in Egypt and Uzbekistan’, Democratization, 25, 5 (2018), pp. 882–900; A. Dukalskis and C. Patane, ‘Justifying Power: When Autocracies Talk about Themselves and Their Opponents’, Contemporary Politics, 25, 4 (2019), pp. 457–78.

12 M. Josua, ‘Legitimation Towards Whom? Managing the Legitimacy Crisis in Algeria During the Arab Uprisings’, Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft, 11, 2 (2017), pp. 301–24.

13 Dukalskis and Patane, ‘Justifying Power’.

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16 Huang, ‘Pathology’.

17 Ibid.

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21 Wedeen, Ambiguities, p. 6.

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80 See L. Mwainyekule and F. Frimpong, ‘The Pandemic and the Economy of Africa: Conflicting Strategies Between Tanzania and Ghana’, Digital Government: Research and Practice, 1, 4 (2020), pp. 1–8.

81 ‘Magufuli: Our Economy Comes First in Covid-19 Fight’, The Citizen, 17 May 2020, available at https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/news/Magufuli–Our-economy-comes-first-in-Covid-19-fight/1840340-5555628-iu5ti6z/index.html, retrieved 18 May 2020.

82 Ibid.

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86 Taylor, ‘Omicron Wave’.

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88 Lihiru, ‘Covid-19’, p. 8.

89 Collaboration on International ICT Policy (CIPESA), ‘Tanzania Tramples Digital Rights in Fight Against Covid-19’, blog (Kampala, CIPESA, 19 October 2020), available at https://cipesa.org/2020/10/tanzania-tramples-digital-rights-in-fight-against-covid-19-as-elections-loom/, retrieved 25 October 2020.

90 ‘Tanzania Opposition Leader Attacked Months before the Elections’, Al Jazeera, 9 June 2020, available at https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/6/9/tanzania-opposition-leader-attacked-months-before-the-elections, retrieved 10 June 2020.

91 S. Awami, ‘“My Tanzanian family is split over coronavirus”’, BBC, 29 July 2020, available at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-53492436, retrieved 1 August 2020.

92 CIPESA, ‘Tanzania Tramples Rights’.

93 Ibid.

94 United Nations Human Rights (UNHR) Office of the High Commissioner, ‘UN Experts Call on Tanzania to End Crackdown on Civic Space’, press release, Geneva, 22 July 2020, available at https://www.ohchr.org/en/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=26117&LangID=E, retrieved 17 March 2021.

95 K. Weghorst, ‘Political Attitudes and Response Bias in Semi-Democratic Regimes: A Survey Experiment Comparing the List Experiment and Randomized Response in Tanzania’, (unpublished online paper, Nashville, 2015), available at https://www.keithweghorst.com/uploads/9/0/4/7/9047071/weghorst_lerrt_2015.pdf, retrieved 8 August 2021. See also K. Croke, ‘Tools of Single Party Hegemony in Tanzania: Evidence from Surveys and Survey Experiments’, Democratization, 24, 2 (2017), pp. 189–208, available at https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2016.1146696, retrieved 12 March 2021.

96 For example, ‘Democracy vs Development in Magufuli’s Tanzania’, The East African, 14 October 2016, available at https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/democracy-vs-development-in-magufuli-s-tanzania-1356634, retrieved 15 March 2021; ‘Magufuli Keeps Nation on a High’, The Citizen, 12 February 2016, available at https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/national/magufuli-keeps-nation-on-a-high–2547230, retrieved 15 March 2021.

97 ‘The Overriding Issues in Tanzania’s 2020 Election Campaign So Far’, The Citizen, 7 September 2020, available at https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/national/-the-overriding-issues-in-tanzania-s-2020-election-campaign-so-far-2715810, retrieved 8 September 2020.

98 D. Paget, ‘The Rally-Intensive Campaign: A Distinct Form of Electioneering in Sub-Saharan Africa and Beyond’, The International Journal of Press/Politics, 24, 4 (2019), pp. 444–64, https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161219847952, retrieved 19 March 2020.

99 ‘Magufuli Criticised as Tanzania Bans Rallies’, The East African, 11 June 2016, available at https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/news/east-africa/magufuli-criticised-as-tanzania-bans-rallies–1351138, retrieved 22 February 2022.

100 Cross, ‘Cybercrime and Policing’.

101 C. Cross, ‘Dissent as Cybercrime: Social Media, Security and Development in Tanzania’, Journal of Eastern African Studies, 15, 3 (2021), pp. 455–6, available at https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2021.1952797, 7 August 2021.

102 D. Sakpa, ‘Tanzania Restricts Social Media During Election’, DW (Deutsche Welle), 29 October 2020, available at https://www.dw.com/en/tanzania-restricts-social-media-during-election/a-55433057, retrieved 3 November 2020.

103 X. Aldekoa, ‘Tanzania, el país del virus del no’, La Vanguardia, 21 March 2021, available at https://www.lavanguardia.com/internacional/20210321/6603110/tanzania-coronavirus-covid-negacionismo-libre-virus.html, retrieved 6 April 2021; Sippy, ‘Covid-Skeptical’.

104 The Tanzanian government has a track record of manipulating statistics. See R.D. Carlitz and R. McLellan, ‘Open Data from Authoritarian Regimes: New Opportunities, New Challenges’, Perspectives on Politics, 19, 1 (2020), pp. 160–70.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Robert Macdonald

Robert Macdonald Research Fellow in African Studies, Centre of African Studies, The University of Edinburgh, Chrystal Macmillan Building, 15a George Square, Edinburgh, EH8 9LD, UK. Email: [email protected] http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0404-0256

Thomas Molony

Thomas Molony Senior Lecturer in African Studies, Centre of African Studies, The University of Edinburgh, 18 Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh, EH8 9LN, UK. Email: [email protected] http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7336-5527

Victoria Lihiru

Victoria Lihiru Lecturer, Department of Public Law, The Open University of Tanzania, Second Floor, Block C, Kawawa Road, Kinondoni, Dar es Salaam, 23409, Tanzania. Email: [email protected] http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2666-5804