Where is Bonnie? Wife asks as she demands activist’s return from Tanzania

Boniface Mwangi’s wife says she does not know about the Kenyan activist’s whereabouts since he was arrested in Dar es Salaam on Monday.

Njeri Mwangi, a journalist, told reporters in Nairobi on Wednesday that she had visited the Tanzania High Commission in Nairobi where officials told her they did not have information about her husband.

Mwangi and his Ugandan counterpart Agather Atuhaire were arrested by suspected military officers after travelling to observe Tanzanian opposition leader Tundu Lissu’s treason trial.

But despite their Tanzanian lawyers being informed the two were to be deported, Njeri said they had not been in contact since.

“I last spoke to Boniface on Monday afternoon. The Tanzanian authorities are saying they have deported him but why is there no communication? Where is Bonnie?” she said.

“Give us back Boniface, wounded or dead. It has been very agonising for my family and it is not fair or right what they are doing to him.”

On Tuesday, a Tanzanian rights group said they had been told by police that the activists had been deported. However, Amnesty International said the duo was held incommunicado by military officers.

Mwangi was among several East African activists and lawyers who travelled to Kenya’s southern neighbour to stand in solidarity with Lissu.

Most were, however, denied entry upon landing at the Julius Nyerere International Airport in Dar es Salaam on Sunday and Monday, detained then later deported to Nairobi.

They include PLP Kenya leader and former Justice Minister Martha Karua, former Chief Justice Willy Mutunga, Law Society of Kenya (LSK) Council member Gloria Kimani, as well as activists Lynn Ngugi, Hanifa Adan, and Hussein Khalid.

President Samia Suluhu on Monday said foreign activists would not be allowed to “interfere” in Tanzania's affairs.

"We have started to observe a trend in which activists from within our region are attempting to intrude and interfere in our affairs," she said in a televised speech during the launch of the country’s new foreign policy.

Suluhu, whom critics accuse of taking Tanzania back to her authoritarian predecessor John Magufuli’s times, urged security and defence organs “not to allow ill-mannered individuals from other countries to cross the line here."