recommendation from a national task force TANZANIA set up in May by the incoming president to inform state response to the pandemic. The United Republic of Tanzania taskforce recommended that the authorities Head of state and government: Samia Suluhu Hassan implement preventive measures to tackle the (replaced John Pombe Magufuli in March) spread of the virus. In August, the government started providing electronic post- Following the sudden death of President vaccination certificates as proof of Magufuli, the incoming president vaccination, fulfilling international established a task force to improve the requirements. According to the WHO, authorities’ response to the pandemic, Tanzania had administered over 2,431,769 marking a shift in her predecessor's policy Covid-19 vaccine doses by the end of the of Covid-19 denial. The government year, representing 4% of the population. continued to limit the rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful REFUGEES’ AND MIGRANTS’ RIGHTS assembly by implementing draconian Burundian refugees in Tanzania continued to measures targeting political dissidents and live in fear. UN human rights experts said opposition, human rights defenders, that in 2021 the police and intelligence journalists and media outlets. The services, in cooperation with the Burundian authorities continued to pressure Burundian intelligence services, continued to use refugees into returning to Burundi. The violence, arbitrary arrests, strict encampment government lifted a ban on pregnant girls policies and threats of deportation to attending regular schools. pressure the refugees to leave the country. BACKGROUND The government also continued to implement refugee returns facilitated by UNHCR, the Samia Suluhu Hassan was sworn in as UN refugee agency. Government and Tanzania’s first female president on 19 UNHCR sources estimated that, at the end of March. She pledged to improve human December, there were 162,711 Burundian rights, but many of the commitments were refugees in Tanzania, representing about yet to be acted upon at the end of the year. 65% of the country’s refugee population; and RIGHT TO HEALTH UNHCR and other partners in Tanzania had supported more than 20,000 Burundian Public health prevention measures were refugees to return to their country, many of largely absent in the earlier part of the year. whom left Tanzania because of pressure from President Magufuli, who died in March, had the Tanzanian government. downplayed the scale of the pandemic, including by publicly dismissing the use of WOMEN’S AND GIRLS’ RIGHTS face masks, social distancing and vaccines. On 24 November, the government Until May, the government withheld announced it had lifted a 2017 ban on information relating to Covid-19, disregarding pregnant girls, and girls with children, from WHO guidelines on how to respond to the attending regular schools. Since 2017, the 1 pandemic. In February and March, religious authorities had implemented the ban under leaders reported a surge in the number of the Education Regulations Act 2002 which Covid-19-related deaths, including of nurses, states that students can be expelled if they priests and nuns. The new president’s are married or commit a criminal offence. administration reversed her predecessor’s In August, the president made sexist and approach, strengthening measures to control other offensive comments about women the virus. On 28 July, the government rolled footballers, describing some of them as “flat- out its Covid-19 vaccination programme, chested” and suggesting that their physical which prioritized health workers, following a appearance would prevent them from Amnesty International Report 2021/22 360