Global News Podcast - Tanzanian president sworn in after election unrest

Episode Date: November 3, 2025

Tanzania’s President, Samia Suluhu Hassan, begins her second term in office following hundreds of reported deaths in violence linked to a contested election. Also, as the tentative ceasefire in Gaza continues, plans are being made to rebuild the devastated territory. Valencia's provincial leader resigns after criticism over his response to devastating floods last year. Three people will stand trial in Hong Kong accused of organising events to commemorate the anniversary of the Tiananmen killings. And the actor Anthony Hopkins reflects on a life of highs and lows at age eighty-seven. He said it had been a laugh.The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight. Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment. Get in touch: [e-mail]

This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Andrew Peach and at 1630 on Monday the 3rd of November. These are our main stories. Tanzania's president, Samir Saluhu Hassan, is sworn in for a second term under tight security after disputed elections marred by violence and protests. The leader of Spain's Valencia region resigns, a year after being accused of mishandling the response to flash flooding

that killed around 230 people. Also in this podcast, fears grow for tens of thousands of people trapped in Sudan's Elfashah. The testimony from these people and from local responders that we've worked with in Elfashah is incredibly grim. It's violent. They describe summary executions. We begin, though, in Tanzania. After days of violent unrest, President Samir Salih Tullahou Hassan, has been sworn in for a second term. She swore to perform her duties with diligence and sincerity

and vowed to treat everyone fairly in line with the country's laws. But hundreds of people died in clashes after the presidential election which she won with nearly 98% of the vote. With many opposition challenges, either imprisoned or barred from running, international observers have strongly criticized how the election was conducted. Akisa Wanderer is in Nairobi and told me more about the ceremony and the extraordinary security surrounding it. An unusual ceremony that broke from tradition where the public often attends the swearing-in of an elected president. This time round, there was heavy security and only a select

few government officials foreign dignitaries and members of the ruling party were present in this particular ceremony. President Samia Sulu Hassan is speaking, saying that the time for elections is over and it's time to rebuild, saying that she's ready to serve the country, but also said that she's saddened by the loss of life and destruction of property that has been witnessed since last week on Wednesday when Tanzanians went to the polls and also said that among those who've been arrested for disrupting security and the unrest were people from neighboring countries. Very interesting and strong lines coming out of her speech, but she said she's ready to work for people of Tanzania from now henceforth.

We'll come on to the future and rebuilding the country in a second. First of all, they've got to get through today without further violence. Of course, because there's been tension in Tanzania since Wednesday during Paul Day and that disputed election was followed by mass protests in the commercial capital of Darisalam and other parts of the country. A brutal crackdown followed, and the opposition is putting a death toll from that crackdown at about 700 to 800. Of course, reports that we are unable to verify because Tanzania has been in total internet blackout since Wednesday.

Electricity was also disrupted for the better part of the days and was only just restored yesterday. So it's been very difficult to get information out of the. But the opposition still says they reject this particular election results and are calling on the International Criminal Court to begin conducting independent investigations into the alleged mass killing. So it's just day one, but the president seemingly will have a full entry and especially when it comes to public interests and confidence in her leadership. And will she be able to rule effectively after all that's gone on? Well, it's going to be difficult because she's coming in at a time when there are very deep divisions in Tanzania, regardless of the fact that the Electoral Commission said she won by 98% of the vote, which translates to about 32 million people. It will be interesting to see how she is received by the people.

From the comments we are seeing on social media platforms and general reactions we are seeing from Tanzanians, they seem to feel that the democratic processes in this country, are not working right now and that so many things have gone wrong even before this particular election. You're talking about repression of free speech, a crackdown on critics like opposition leaders, activists. We've seen mass abductions and killings. And these are some of the things that have dogged her presidencies and will likely follow her into this second term. Akisa Wanderer with me from Nairobi. For more than a year, the head of the region of Valencia in eastern Spain has been under pressure to resign. It's over his handling of the response to the devastating flash flooding

that killed more than 230 people in October last year. There's been a series of protests in Valencia and on the first anniversary of the disaster, tens of thousands of people held a demonstration calling for Carlos Mathan to resign. On Monday, Mr Mathan bowed to that pressure and stepped down as the regional leader. I spoke to our correspondent in Madrid, Guy Hedgeko. There has been enormous pressure on Mr Mathan over the last year. there have been protests held in the streets of Valencia every month demanding his resignation,

the most recent one just last weekend, when 50,000 people or so turned out to demand his resignation. Now, for a long time, it looked as if he was going to resist that pressure and just keep going. But I think last week was a turning point because we had this memorial service for the victims of the floods last year, just last week. And when he appeared at the memorial service, he was barracked and shouted out by relatives of the victims that some of them were calling him a murderer, calling him a coward. And he did look really shaken by that. And there was very much a feeling that that event perhaps was a turning point and had caused him to think twice about his position, having resisted so long.

And also his People's Party, the Conservative Party, which he's a member of, also seriously seemed to consider his position as well. I just remind us of what happened, the flooding, but also what was considered to be a pretty botched response to the flooding which led to all those deaths. Yes, these were floods that hit the east of Spain, in particular the eastern region of Valencia. Almost all the deaths, 229 deaths were in the region of Valencia. There were several other deaths in other neighbouring regions, but it was Valencia that was hardest hit. Many people were caught out in their cars or out in the streets or in ground floor flats, for example, or in, basements and garages. And that was where many of these victims were caught and died. And it emerged afterwards that Mr. Mathon had really not been present. He'd not been at his office. He'd not

been at emergency meetings that day because he was having a long, almost four-hour lunch with a journalist in a restaurant that day. So he was missing emergency meetings. And also his administration, when it did issue finally an emergency alarm to people's phone, it was several hours too late, and by that time, dozens of people had already died. Guy Hedgko in Madrid. The ceasefire in Gaza is still holding, and that's despite recriminations between Israel and Hamas and Israeli airstrikes last week. The next steps, though, including the arrival of an international stabilisation force, the disarmament of Hamas and the withdrawal of Israeli forces still seem some way off. Even further off,

the prospect of Gaza being rebuilt. That process is likely to take decades, cost billions of dollars. But it's already something planners, Palestinian and international, are thinking about. From homegrown projects to glossy international investment opportunities, there's a bewildering array of proposals. Our diplomatic correspondent Paul Adams has been looking at some of them. The bulldozers are hard at work,

shoveling rubble into waiting trucks. After two years of destruction, the cleanup has begun. Parts of Gaza City are disfigured, recognition. If the ceasefire holds, recovery can start. But it's not going to be quick. It could take a generation. This was my house, says Abu Yad, pointing to a mangled heap of concrete and steel in Gaza's Sheikh Radwan neighborhood. It was here, but there's no house left. He's 63. If Gaza ever rises from the ashes, he doesn't expect to be around to see it. At this rate, I think it will take 10 years.

We'll be dead. We'll die without seeing reconstruction. The scale of the challenge is mind-boggling. The UN estimates the cost of damage at $70 billion. The Gaza Strip is littered with 60 million tons of rubble mixed in with dangerous, unexploded bombs and dead bodies. Almost 300,000 houses and apartments have been damaged or destroyed. destroyed. This is the heart of the city of Gaza. Gaza's Hamas appointed mayor, Yahya al-Saraj, is on the streets today wearing a high-vis jacket, surveying the ruins of his city.

Gaza is no stranger to destruction and recovery, but the work has hardly started. We lack building materials. We badly need 1,000 tons of cement to start many jobs to repair manholes, and we need heavy equipment, we need vehicles, we need spare parts for everything. Tell me what we're looking at here. Well, this is the Palestine National Spatial Plan. There's no shortage of plans at the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. As Stefan Salome, the planning minister, pulls up his government's official version on a big plasma screen. Gaza will look different, he says, but some things have to stay the same.

don't forget that 70% of the Gaza's population are Palestinian refugees. And we need to preserve the refugee identity. We need to preserve the soul and the spirit of Gaza. It will not be rebuilt the way it was before, but it could be rebuilt in the way that the Palestinian identity and the spirit of our people in Gaza can be preserved. There are, of course, other visions. Donald Trump famously posted this outlandish spoof on his social media account back in February. Donald is coming to set you free, bringing the light for all to see. No more tunnels, no more fear. Trump Gaza is finally here.

But a leaked plan published more recently in the Washington Post painted a similarly glossy vision of a high-tech Gaza Strip under U.S. trusteeship. The Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation Trust, Great for short, was said to be the work of Israeli-American consultants with input from members of Tony Blair's Institute for Global Change. It's the kind of vision that alarms Palestinians. Raja Khalidi runs the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute. I think what I'm saying is that these sort of almost hallucinatory plans

are just sort of creating an opening for disaster capitalism that is worrying. And I don't think that, you know, I don't think they're going to get away with it. Gaza is not a blank slate waiting to be turned into Dubai. Shelly Culbertson, a senior researcher with the Rand think tank, says rebuilding will take many forms. Living in the damaged but habitable communities and rebuild well in them, we think is going to be a key way of preserving communities and allowing people to move back. At the same time, you can't do that with all the communities. Some places have been so destroyed and damaged and dangerous that the only thing

to do really is wall them off, raise them down and completely rebuild. The Gaza Strip already has a Riviera stretches of beach where exhausted traumatised Palestinians can briefly look away from the horror. Reconstruction, the plans and who intends to pay for it all are due to be discussed at a conference in Egypt later this month. But a date has yet to be set. Right now, a new Gaza feels a very long way off. That report from our diplomatic correspondent Paul Adams.

Next to Sudan. Since the paramilitary rapid support forces, the RSF, seized the city of Elfashir, the last stronghold of the army in the Darfur region more than a week ago. Tens of thousands of people are believed to have fled. International aid agencies are warning that thousands more remain trapped in the city amid reports of executions, sexual violence and looting. Many are trying to reach to Wheeler, where aid agencies are offering help. Eyewitnesses say some have been killed by the RSF,

while others, especially young men, suspected of belonging to the Sudanese army, have been captured and abused. Here's our correspondent, Barbara Plet Usher. Any man suspected of being a member of the army is held back. Some of them are beaten, some of them are killed, some of them are detained. Apparently some held for ransom. One man told us that when he was trying to leave El Fasher, he said he had nothing to do with the army, but one of the RSF fighters said to the other, all of these people, all of them,

all of them who escape from Elfasher are the army, all of them kill them. Noah Taylor is the head of operations in Sudan for the Norwegian Refugee Council. He spoke to me from Nairobi. We have teams in Toilah, which is about 60 kilometres outside of Alfasha. They're receiving people who've arrived from the city in recent days. And the testimony from these people and from local responders that we've worked with in Elfashah is incredibly grim. It's a very tense situation. It's violent.

They describe summary executions. They describe armed men going door to door and look. looking for people. And this is a city that has been under siege for over 18 months. So there is no food. People have described buying a bucket of animal feed to feed their children for 30 US dollars. This is incredibly violent. It's incredibly grim. It's incredibly worrying. Those who do get out managed to get to Tuila. And they're the ones that escaping these arrests, this harassment and these executions. It's incredibly desperate. And just on the line for people listening, although this has been going on, as you say, for 18 months or more, in recent days,

the situation in Alfasha has changed considerably. Yeah, this latest violence has been exacerbated by a significant escalation of attacks from the rapid support forces on Sudanan forces and joint forces in the city. That's definitely what has contributed to this recent spike in violence, but this is a situation that has been grinding on for months. And although there has been a fair bit of news reporting in recent days, it often slips down the news agenda in a way, which I'm sure is frustrating for people like yourself working on the ground there? The scale of the crisis in wider Sudan is incredibly

distressing. We're talking about 25 million people. That's more than half the population that are food insecure. That's up from a 45% increase from December 2020. So this situation is getting exponentially worse. We've had cholera outbreaks across the country this year. We've had flooding in the east of the country. And now this repetitive grinding violence in cities like Alfasha and in Cadugli in the South, where civilians are not protected, they are deliberately targeted. Aid organisations and local responders are targeted and there is no respite from the war.

What needs to happen, Noah, to bring the violence to an end, but also to get aid to the people who need it? Fundamentally, we need access. We need access to people in need. We need unrestricted movement to get goods and communities into the people who need it. And people themselves, the civilians need protection, any protection to leave these

war zones to get to where assistance is provided and to do so safely and dignified. But fundamentally, the people of Sudan need an end to this war. And they need political will from actors like the UK to actually bring those accountable to justice and actually push for an end to this madness. Noah Taylor, head of operations in Sudan for the Norwegian Refugee Council. Still to come, one of Britain's best-known actors shares one of his darkest moments. I was driving my car in a complete alcoholic blackout, and I could have killed someone. I was

out of control, and I said to somebody, I need help, and I made the phone call. Now, let's go back to events in Victoria Park in Hong Kong in 2018. More than 100,000 people gathered to hold a candlelit vigil to mark the 29th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown in Beijing. The event was held every year until 2020 when it was banned by China. Now, a court in Hong Kong has ruled that three people who are again, accused of organising the demonstrations will face trial. Mickey Bristow, tell me more.

These protests were, as you mentioned, there to commemorate the 1989 killings of students and ordinary people, protesters in Beijing, who'd been arguing for more openness, more democracy in the Chinese government. The government sent in the military, and many people were killed, hundreds, perhaps, thousands. Now, in China itself, I was reported in China for many years. I never saw any commemoration of that event. The only place it could take place was in Hong Kong because at the time Hong Kong was under British rule

and then even afterwards, it was still open, it was still free. Under Chinese rule, they were still allowed to commemorate and mark that particular event. And it's not just marking it as well, it's remembering it because in China there's no word of it ever spoken, no, it's never taught in schools, there's no mention of it. So Hong Kong was really the only place you could remember and commemorate this event. So if it was allowed in Hong Kong at that time, why are the authorities pursuing those who organised it now?

Well, what happened is there were protests throughout the 2010s in Hong Kong. The authorities decided to crack down. And it coincided with the COVID pandemic in 2020. That's what the authorities said initially was their reason for not allowing these commemorations to take place. But in the same year, the Chinese government brought in the national security law in Hong Kong. on which is severely cracked down completely almost on dissent in the former British territory and since then there have been no commemorations

have been allowed. This court case particularly taking place now is about today it was three people who were going to be standing trial for organising events to commemorate this Tiananmen protest and essentially they were saying that they shouldn't go forward to trial because they've been accused of an inciting subversion

of state power by unlawful means And they were saying, well, what are the unlawful means we took to do this? Essentially, the judge said basically any attempt to end the one-party rule is considered unconstitutional. So therefore any means is unlawful. So therefore their trial will go ahead in January next year. Right. And this is in the broader context of almost no dissent being allowed in Hong Kong at all now. No dissent at all, really, in Hong Kong.

In fact, one of the three defendants stand in trial. She's been in prison already for four years. she was arrested and put in prison for simply urging people to light candles on June the 4th to commemorate these Tiananmen killing. So if that's the level of repression you've got, there's really no protest allowed in Hong Kong at the moment. Mickey Bristow reporting. In 2019, British MPs said universities in the UK were failing to recognise the level of interference from foreign government and their report highlighted concerns about the influence of China in particular.

New documents seen by the BBC show that China waged a two-year campaign of intimidation against Sheffield Hallam University in the north of England in an effort to close down research into human rights abuses. The target was an academic called Laura Murphy, a professor of human rights and contemporary slavery. Last April, we started to hear news that the Chinese government, the Foreign Intelligence Agency, was intimidating and harassing and interrogating the staff,

that the university has in Beijing. And the university let me know that this was happening and that, in fact, it appeared that the Chinese state security wanted me to stop doing our research. At the time, the university backed us and said we could continue the research. But over the next couple of months, it was clear that that influence grew

from the state security service to the university and the university became more and more committed to ending my research team's work entirely. Professor Murphy's work focuses on Uyghurs, a persecuted Muslim minority in China being co-opted into forced labour programmes. China denies allegations of human rights abuses. Our correspondent Damien Grematicus told me more. It started with their website in China being unavailable. So Chinese students looking to apply to Sheffield couldn't find information about courses, couldn't do applications, couldn't complete that process.

and they did see internal emails that have been handed over to the researcher who was behind some of the research happening to Laura Murphy show that student numbers dropped over that period. The university was concerned about it. And in 2024, those emails say that some Chinese state security officers visited Sheffield Hallam's recruitment office in Beijing, that their tone was threatening. They told staff there that the research had to stop

and then the university then came back and delivered a message to the security staff that they had decided not to publish a final report by Professor Murphy's unit. And those internal documents said that after that, relations immediately improved. And just give us a sense of what China have said about this, what the university have said themselves. Yes, so importantly, what China have said is that this is unfounded allegations. They push back very strongly. They say that this unit at Sheffield Hallam University says has released multiple fake reports on Xinjiang that are seriously flawed. The university itself, they have come out and said that the decision that was taken not to continue with the research was, they say, based on understanding of a complex set of circumstances at the time, including being unable to secure the necessary professional indemnity insurance.

for their research. And the university do make clear that they have now said that Professor Murphy can resume her research and they are committed to supporting her academic freedom. The leverage that the Chinese state has here is the value of Chinese students to universities in the UK and other countries around the world. Absolutely. And there are Chinese students are the largest cohort in the UK. There are 200,000 at the minute, the Chinese embassy says. that is a very valuable source of foreign income. And it's certainly a concern, I think, in parts of the UK government, the vulnerability of universities then who could be exposed to such pressure. And Damien, you're a former BBC China correspondent. Just set the wider context for us of how China can look for organisations around the world, be they universities or whatever, and apply pressure like this. It's quite a common accusation. It is. And China certainly

tries to wield pressure in many ways. So work as a journalist in China, you come under a lot of pressure. Certainly commercial companies operating in China or dealing with China sometimes will say, very often not publicly, but will say that they face pressure in all sorts of ways because China is willing to wield the sort of access to its market as a tool of influence. My correspondent Damien Grammaticus with me. from around the world are flying to the Amazon rainforest in Brazil for the start of COP 30, the climate summit. It's now just five years from 2030 when countries are expected to meet their pledges they made in 2015 to limit rising temperatures. So what can we expect from this meeting

is the fact that it's being held in the Amazon significant? It's here from Cass Flynn, who's the UN Development Program's Global Director of Climate Change. It's hugely significant. The Amazon rainforest, of course, is an enormous symbol for the climate crisis, and not to mention the reality that when we think about the lungs of the world, this is the Amazon and who cares for the Amazon. It is often safeguarded by indigenous peoples, by local communities that have an enormous role on the front lines of the climate crisis. And so I think for the government of Brazil to be gathering the world at the Amazon, it is it is hugely poignant for for everyone because it is they really are coming to talk about the climate crisis on the front lines of the climate crisis there are some things that have been overshadowing the geography of it though as well you use the word symbol I mean how symbolic is it

for example that Brazil's president lula has been criticized for giving the thumbs up for plans for more drilling of oil in the amazon and also the cutting down of trees in order to build this new road, a four-lane highway, so that the area can be accessible for all the delegates who are going to be coming to Bellum, the area that has been held in the Amazon for Cobb. It's really, and we share, you know, the United Nations Secretary General expressed an immense disappointment at the idea of being able to drill in the Amazon. And I think that it symbolizes the difficulties and the choices that world leaders and countries have to make when it comes to the climate crisis, because these decisions

are not easy, and they are not simple, and they affect every single person and every single community in the world. And certainly we hope that world leaders sort of rise to this occasion and hopeful that as countries really start to transition away from fossil fuels, that they're going to direct this level investment in ways that are are strategic and better for the world. But certainly I think that the, as you say, kind of the symbol of having this in Bill M M is also the symbol of the complexity of how these leaders are responding to this crisis. Over the past 10 years, by several measures, it can be argued that everything that was agreed 10 years ago in Paris in 2015, countries haven't met some of the agreements that had been made,

namely to be on track to keep global temperatures below a rising of 1.5 degrees compared to pre-industrial levels. So how hopeful can we be of what can be achieved 10 years since Paris? When we adopted the Paris Agreement 10 years ago, there was this immense hope. that very quickly we would be on the pathway toward meeting those goals that we set out for ourselves, and namely this, what has now become this threshold of 1.5 degrees. And certainly, something that is important about all of this is that when we do cooperate on the climate crisis, that that cooperation does pay off. And without the Paris Agreement, we would be headed for a four-degree world, which would be just utterly devastating.

It's Cass Flynn talking to my colleague Priya Rye. Anthony Hopkins is one of the finest actors of our age, a two-time Oscar winner. He's now written an autobiography called We Did Okay Kid. It's a story about his extraordinary journey from Port Talbot, the town in Wales where he grew up to Hollywood. And it is a journey paved with pain, rejection and alcohol. Our culture editor, Katie Razzle, met the actor in Los Angeles. Even in Los Angeles, Sir Anthony Hopkins gets noticed. I guess that happens all the time. Looking back on his life, as he publishes his autobiography, he tells me he's pragmatic.

Life is tough. Enjoy it now before it's too late. Just enjoy it as much as you can. Don't be a victim. As a child, he was a loner who was bullied at school. Kids called him elephant head. He was written off and slapped around by teachers, even his parents couldn't understand their failure of a son. I was not bright. It was not the brightest piece of cutler in the drawer. So what I did, to compensate my academic shortcomings, I would learn massive pieces of poetry and Shakespeare. Then the turning point was in 1935-17. My school report arrived and it was pretty bleak. Anthony seems to be way below the educational standard of the school. And my father, with all good intentions.

I don't know what's going to happen to you. What's going to happen to you? I mean, can't you concentrate? I remember stepping back, and I said, one day I'll show you. And within a few months, I got a scholarship as an actor. This son of a baker's film career took off immediately from his debut playing a future king

in Haworth Productions, The Lion in winter. I remember the very first teen I had with Catherine Hepburn. Now I've only one desire left to see you, King. The only thing you want to see is father's vitals on the bed of letters. She said, just speak the lands. Just don't act. Just do it. And I took that advice.

And as Hannibal Lecter, the role that won him his first Oscar, in the silence of the lambs, directed by Jonathan Demi, he was bone-chilling. Closer. The more still you are and deadly, and don't take your eyes of the person, that's terrifying. Despite his success, he had his own demons. He was regularly drunk and angry until he had an epiphany. December of 1975, I was driving my car in a complete alcoholic blackout. And I could have killed someone. I was out of control.

And I said to somebody, I need help. And I made the phone call. The craving left. I just never come back. What are your biggest regrets? People have hurt over the years. The stupid things they did. In the British Army, I was screamed out by sergeants and trainers, you know. So you withdraw into yourself thinking, okay, you can't hurt me, can you?

That's how I think I developed my own personality. Of course, it's not the healthiest way to go through life. Ah, that's a bit sharp. Not many can say they've had a private piano recital from Anthony Hopkins. He played us one of his own compositions. This talented musician, artist and actor seems at 87 contented. Yeah, I am. So I hope to be around a little longer.

But even that, I thinking, oh well, I had a good time. I had a laugh. A culture editor, Katie Razel, with Anthony Hopkins in Los Angeles. That's all from us for now. There'll be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later. If you'd like to comment on this one, drop us an email, Global Podcast at BBC.co.com. Or go to X, where we are at BBC World Service.

Just use the hashtag Global News. Pod. This edition was mixed by Chris A Blackwell. The producer was Ed Horton. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Andrew Peach. Thanks for listening. And until next time, goodbye.