Can cyber bullying and harassment be prosecuted in Tanzania?

• The term defamation was defined mean the publication of a statement which reflects on a person’s reputation
  and tends to lower him on the estimate of right-thinking members of the society generally or tend to make them shun or avoid him.
• There are two forms of defamation slander and libel.
• When the defamatory statement is published the liability is not limited to the writer but it also extends to the
  publisher and in terms of online publication, to internet service providers including blogs, websites, web hosting and the like.
• Repetition of defamatory statement is a fresh publication and creates a self and independent cause of action.
• There are four elements of defamation, i.e. the defamatory statement against the Plaintiff, the statement referred to him or her, the statement was published and the Plaintiff suffered damages.
• For a case of defamation to stand there must be publication of the same and the later be accessed by other
  persons regardless of the media of communication / publication.
• There is no defamation for statements sent straight to the person of whom it is written, since for you cannot
  publish a libel of a man against himself.
• The Court defined the term social defamation, or in other words character assassination, cyber bullying and
  cyber harassment to mean, the content that is published to a social media platform that defames or is injurious
  to the person or business reputation. It occurs when a computer or modern electronic devices connected to the
  internet is used as a tool or medium to defame a person or entity (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc) or sending an email containing defamatory content about a person with the intention to defame him or her.     

For online defamation to stand the followings are the elements to be:

          i. Reasonableness
          ii. The hypothetical reasonable reader is not naïve but not unduly suspicious
          iii. Over-elaborated analysis is best avoided
          iv. The intention of the publisher is irrelevant
          v. The publication must be read as a whole and any bone / antidote taken together
          vi. The hypothetical reader is taken to be representative of those who would read the publication in question.

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