One of the Muslim Clerics in Tanzania’s Northern City of Arusha has once again been sentenced to death by hanging after the appellate court threw out his appeal against the previous high court ruling.

The accused, Sheikh Jafari Lema, ​has been serving as the Imam of Masjid Quba in Arusha City.

Together with five others, religious colleagues in Arusha, Sheikh Jafari Lema was condemned to death by hanging by the Court of Appeal sitting in the city.

The court delivered the judgment on Monday, July 27, 2026, after dismissing the appeal they had earlier filed in January 2024.

The judgment was read to them virtually online while they were still being held under custody at the Kisongo Prison in the suburbs of Arusha City.

The other convicted persons besides Sheikh Lema, are Sheikh Abashari Hassan, Sheikh Yusuph Ally, Sheikh Ramadhan Hamadi, Sheikh Abdulhasan Juma and Sheikh Kassim Idrisa.

According to an official statement issued by the Council of Imams (Shura ya Maimamu), the six suspected sheikhs were arrested and have been under prison custody for at least nine years now.

On December 9, 2023, they were sentenced to death by hanging.

Following that judgment, the Tanzania Council of Imams, in collaboration with the families of the sheikhs, filed an appeal in January 2024 with the Arusha Court of Appeal.

However, on July 27, 2026, the Arusha Court of Appeal dismissed their appeal and upheld the death sentence by hanging.

“The six condemned Muslim clerics in Arusha now join the other 14 sheikhs who have also been sentenced to death by hanging and are currently imprisoned in several regions of the country including Dar es Salaam, Tanga, and Mtwara,” the statement said.

The six convicted sheikhs were arrested in 2014 and charged in connection with the bombing of a church gathering in an incident which occurred in May 2013 at the Olasiti Catholic Parish of Arusha.