beijing put its economic growth last year at 6.6%, the lowest for three decades. the imf says the slowdown, combined with trade disputes and brexit, could affect the whole world. theresa may says a second vote on brexit could damage british social cohesion. she also refused to rule out letting the uk leave the eu without a deal in place. and this story is trending on bbc.com. an episode where peppa visited the queen has inspired to chinese twins to request to meet the queen as well. now on bbc news, stephen sackur talks to the tanzanian opposition mp tundu lissu on hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk.

i'm stephen sackur. tanzania is one of africa's fastest—growing nations economically and demographically as well. it is also governed by one of the continent's most controversial leaders, presidentjohn magafuli, otherwise known as the ‘bulldozer‘. my guest today is one of his leading domestic opponents, tundu lissu. at least he was until gunmen pumped more than 20 bullets into his body in 2017. tundu lissu survived and he has rejoined the fight against a ruler he describes as a petty dictator. tundu lissu, welcome to hardtalk. thank you so much for having me. we are pleased to have you here, not least because 16 months ago it looked as though you were probably dying. somehow, miraculously, you survived an assassination attempt that saw 20 bullets pumped into your body. how are you today? i am very well.

very well compared to what i was 1a months ago. as you say, i was shot multiple times. i was shot 16 times to be exact. i guess some bullets hit the car rather than you because they sprayed... those that hit me were 16 bullets. those that sprayed the car, i'm told were 38. wow. so 16 hits and 22 surgeries later and here i am. you seem to believe that there was a definite political intent to that attack upon you. yes. absolutely. what is your proof? the proof is in the circumstances leading up to the attack. you see, for about six weeks before i was shot there were people following me, following my

car everywhere i went. there were, you know, they were everywhere i went there would be a car tailing me. but that could have been anybody. for those who don't know, you were quite a public figure in tanzania, not just because you are a senior opposition party member, the opposition whip in parliament, but you are also the head of the legal association. the national bar association. so, probably, there were many people, i dare say, some them bad people, who may have had an animus against you — you can't be sure who. those we have proof of having a bad animus against me is the government. for one year preceding the attack on me in september 2017, i was arrested eight times, charged in court with this or that offence of sedition.

this is a free—speech offence, 6 times. there were open calls by people who we know to be members of the ruling party who called openly for my assassination after i had denounced the president, after i had revealed that one of his pet projects, the acquisition of new aircraft for air tanzania, had been seized in canada because of his breach of contract while he was serving as minister of public works. you made a series of serious allegations of corruption and the president has, of course, denied and dismissed all of them. equally, it should be said, that in the intervening months, the 11; or15man£hssmeel the government and the authorities in tanzania have come up with no evidence pointing to any association with the government in terms

of this attack. so you seem to me to be making some allegations and connections and claims that are highly inflammatory in today's tanzania but you don't have the evidence. listen, stephen. i am the chief whip of the official opposition. i'm a parliamentary leader. i live in a government housing compound that is heavily guarded 2a hours, seven days a week. every apartment block inside that compound is guarded 2a—hours, seven days a week. and on the day of the attack, in broad daylight, it was one o'clock in the afternoon during the lunch break. during the parliamentary sessions. gunmen followed me from parliament into this heavily guarded government housing compound where ministers and members of parliament,

the deputy speaker, so on and so forth, where they all live, and there was absolutely no protection. no guard at the gate. there was no security whatsoever. i understand all that. but i am also mindful of legal niceties here and the president did say, after the attack, that he utterly condemned it and he called immediately on law enforcement to catch and punish the culprits. the president, he has never ever spoken in public about this attempted assassination. never. there was a tweet, there was a tweet, a very small very quick tweet and it disappeared. but the president has never ever publicly spoken about the assassination attempt. the president — and this comes from the speaker of parliament — the president has blocked efforts to have me treated at the cost of parliament. which is my statutory right.

just again, to keep people informed of what has happened since, in the year or more since the attack you have had to have medical treatment first in kenya but extensive treatment and rehabilitation in belgium. so you have been based in belgium for quite a while and you have had a lot of time to reflect. when you think of some of the things you said in the lead up to the summer of 2017, before the assassination attempt, you called the president a petty dictator. at one point you called on the international community to treat tanzania, and i quote you directly, as the skunk of the world. and now that you have had time to reflect, do you think you went over the top? governments that kill their citizens, governments that use the security forces to target their political opponents, governments that prohibit political rights which are protected by the constitution, governments that cause civilians

to be abducted and disappear like it was with those obnoxious latin american dictatorships of the 60s and 70s, the governments that have occasioned loss of lives, that destroy innocent lives in the world, those governments deserve to be described as the skunks of the world. how disappointed are you that the tanzanian people, they listen to you, they listen to the president, they weigh up the different messages, but the president enjoys an approval rating of over 50%, reaching 70% in some areas. there is every sign that he and the ruling party will win and win big in the next round of elections. mr sackur, i will say this. during the first year of president magafuli's tenure

we were told his approval rating was in the high 805. one year later, last year, last year, early last year, one of those pollsters came out with polling that showed that the president's approval rating had dropped to 61%. do you know what happened? the managing director of that polling firm had his citizenship questioned, his passport seized and for all intents and purposes they will never do it again because now, immediately after, a new statistics law was passed which says that if you bring out statistics that put the government in a bad light, you are a criminal. on this matter of whether the president is seen by his people to be doing a good job, can we just consider a few of the achievements

of this administration. the magafuli administration. he promised to cut out much of the corruption in the country. in the first few weeks and months of his administration thousands of ghost workers were removed from the pay role. we saw senior figures be removed from the port authority and revenue service because they had been systematically corrupt. if you ask tanzanians today, according to all the evidence, they feel their country is cleaner and less corrupt than it was when he took office. in africa, that is quite an achievement. we also saw the president building a brand—new airport in his home village, like mobutu sese soku in the middle of the forest somewhere in the congo. we saw the president... and they say it openly, that the president is purchasing aircraft for air tanzania corporation. that is not the president'sjob. you point to specific examples but i point to systems.

the tax and revenue service is bringing in more today than it was before magafuli came to power. he has delivered on his promise to make tanzanians pay their taxes to be a more efficient and responsible society and economy. that is a really big deal. 0n the contrary. there was a spike. an increase in tax revenue during the first year in 2016 — 2017, thereabout. and since then, revenue, tax revenue for the government has gone down. why? because the president has attacked the business community. he has attacked private investors, investment is drying up... hang on. you say he attacked private investors. what he has done, again, is deliver on a promise made to get a little tougher with the foreign corporates including the huge mining companies who have been making vast

profit from the natural resources of tanzania for years. he said he would get tougher with them and he has delivered and the tanzanian people, again i return to the polling evidence, it seems they like what he has done. whose polling are we talking about here? when the president and his party and his government passed laws that inhibit independent verification of the statistics provided publicly, who is there to say... well, i don't want to stick to polls. let's take the analysis of a respected independent observer of tanzania, dan paget, who writes on tanzania and affairs at oxford university. he says the magafuli has defied the assumption that african states cannot take on big multinational corporations and win. he sought out a confrontation with the mining companies that eventually led to barrick gold and others agreeing a deal that

involves substantial concessions to tanzania. are you seriously saying you do not like that? barric has not agreed any deal. we are told by the president himself that barrick had agreed to pay $300 million as... i don't know what you would call it, like a golden handshake. but the president himself made a statement that they have agreed to make a payment, an immediate payment of $300 million. they have not paid a penny. not a penny. they were slapped with a tax bill of $194 billion. they have not paid a penny. not a penny. it seems you don't even want the government to take on the big foreign corporates. you have been complaining, saying that we must be nicer to them. i have not said that at all. i spent 19 years from 1999 when everybody, magafuli included, were singing the praises of these investors in the mining sector ripping us off.

19 years as the sole voice to the contrary. if i may say, if it is so clear that magafuli is failing the people, why is it in the last year, a substantial number — at least six and possibly, depending how you read it, ten members of the official opposition in parliament — and, of course, there are various parties in the opposition — but opposition members that seem to have defected to the government's side, including the most senior figures who were leading the opposition to magafuli are now on his side? there has been a major threat, a major commercial enterprise in politics in tanzania over the past one year. what do you mean? i mean precisely that — that people have been given money to change sides, people have been promised that if you change sides, it will ensure that you will return as a candidate and we will use whatever force we have in our capacity to make sure that you win! and that is exactly what happened! you're a very senior

lawyer so you know better than i that it is very dangerous to bandy about these allegations when you don't have specific evidence when, of course, the people who you're making allegations against — i.e. some seniorfigures in the opposition — are not here to defend themselves and they absolutely categorically deny all the charges you've just laid at their door. let's take one example. lawrence masha — he was home affairs minister in the government of kikwete for a while, then he became an opponent of magafuli — was very hard on magafuli — but in recent times has decided what he sees from magafuli is actually quite positive. he says "while you may not always agree with the president and the way he does things, his heart is in the right place. he is having an impact on the lives

of everyday ta nzanians. " mr sackur, in the three years since president magafuli came to office, 380 civilians, villagers, in various villages in kibiti, rufiji and mkuranga district, just south of dar es salaam, have disappeared. bodies have been washed up, found floating in river rufiji, in the indian ocean, beaches. this is unprecedented in the history of tanzania! we have never seen anything like this! we've seen, in those three years, political opponents of the government and his party being murdered with complete impunity. no investigation. no arrest. not even suspicion. martyred in broad daylight! this is unprecedented. now, is this the price that we must pay in order to have less corruption? is this the tanzania you want, where the language being used and the allegations being made are getting ever more inflammatory? the government, clearly, is worried by this.

they've passed a whole raft of measures and proposed some more, which many would say repress freedom of speech. they say it's because they are so very worried that freedom of speech in tanzania is being abused by people spreading false allegations, making up stories. that is why they have put new controls on social media, on bloggers, they've also, from time to time, closed down newspapers, radio stations. ijust wonder whether, again, on reflection, you feel that the way you're making your political arguments is fanning the flames or actually calling tensions. stephen, what i have said about the killings of civilians in the rufiji area, what i have said about the disappearances of political opponents, what i have said about the crackdown on the press, what i have said about, you know,

individual bloggers or people sending these messages on whatsapp groups and so on and so forth has been said with more or less the same vehemence by the charges, by the press, that have been spoken in parliament, they have been said by the international community, they have been repeated basically by the european union in their recent resolution. so what i'm saying — what i'm saying is nothing absolutely nothing new for those who know what has been happening in tanzania for the past three years. it faces you with a choice though. because the government, even with its latest legislation where it wants to repeal the political parties act to make it much for difficult opposition political parties to conduct what is being called activism on the streets, you then face a choice. are you going to confront this government and its repressive legislation openly?

and that could, of course, lead to violence? or are you going to find ways which are peaceable rather than potentially confrontational? we have always — we have always fought political battles peacefully. we have never, ever, advocated the use of violence as a political weapon. let's talk specifically about the reasons why the international community, in the last few months, has expressed grave concerns about what is happening in tanzania and what the magafuli administration is doing. they are particularly focused on some of the highly controversial conservative social messages and actions being made by the government. in particular, the world bank cancelled a $300 million loan to tanzania after the country, the government, reiterated its policy of banning pregnant girls from going to school. the eu withdrew its ambassador and it voiced particular concern about the government's determination, it seems, to root out homosexuality and impose prison sentences of up to 30 years. that has been the law

for quite sometime. it is not magafuli's... i know, but the government now is saying that it wants new measures to identify and punish homosexuals. so my question to you is a key figure in the opposition, are you prepared to speak out loudly against these repressive social measures of the current government? we are on record that the issue of pregnant schoolgirls continuing with their education is a government policy. it is magafuli's own government policy. it is in their own party manifesto. it is in their party documents. it is part of our law. so for the president, for the president to stand up and say "we will no longer educate schoolgirls because they are pregnant" is going not only against the law, it is also going against the stated party policy of his own party. so you're clear on that.

you absolutely reject his stand on that. what about his defence of the punitive laws on homosexuality? would you, as a leading opposition figure here on hardtalk, speak out against those punitive laws? resident magafuli has said this and... i am not asking what he — we know he's deeply socially conservative on these issues. he hasn't — we have to get the record straight, steve! the president, the foreign minister, dr mahiga, has said that whatever actions we that were taken by the regional commissioner for dar es salaam, those are not government policy. that is not government policy! i want to know — and i dare say many people around the world would like to know — is a senior african opposition politician prepared, in public, to say "these laws that we have currently in our country

on homosexuality, punishment of up to 30 years in prison, a re utterly u na cce pta ble and if i achieve power, we will urge rid of those laws". every individual is entitled to their privacy. we should never allow the government to start peeping into people's bedrooms. matters... so you would eliminate these laws which criminalise homosexuality? let me, let me put my... yes, because we're out of time almost. would you eliminate the laws that criminalise and punish homosexuality. if they violate, and i think they violate the privacy, the right to privacy that is protected by the constitution, then those laws are definitely unconstitutional. by the constitution of tanzania — i'm not talking about any other constitution. 0ur constitution says these are private matters and they should remain private matters. in the course of this interview, you have outlined so many different areas where you say the president is taking tanzania in the wrong direction. yes.

you have accused him of an awful lot of bad stuff during our conversation. yes. are you, having had you — all of your operations, your surgery and your rehabilitation, are you now ready to go back to tanzania to fight this president politically, put your name on the ballot for the next presidential election? my treatment is still ongoing. but i have stated clearly that when the doctors declare me fit to go, i will go to tanzania. that is why. i am not in exile. i'm in belgium because i was shot 16 times and doctors have had to operate on me. so are you prepared to go back to tanzania without specific security and safety guarantees? i will go back to tanzania when i'm fully fit. and the president and his government will have to tell the world whether returning home to tanzania, i will be protected by the government — as i should. the government has a responsibility to make sure that i am safe. i'm still a member of parliament. i'll go back to continue the work that i was chosen to do. and you spoke about the ballot.

i have stated if the people of tanzania, if the members of my party believe that i'm the correct person to face president magafuli in 2020, i'm more than ready to do so. tundu lissu, we will keep watching that story. thank you very much for being on hardtalk. thank you so much, stephen. thank you so much, stephen, for having me. hello there. it looks set to be quite treacherously icy out and about first thing this morning.

we've had the overnight rain, sleet and snow giving way to wintry showers which could well wash off some of the salt off the roads, so slippery certainly out there this morning. this is the huge swathe of cloud tied in with the weather front that's bringing that rain and hill snow, and it's going to bring substantial snow and problems to parts of europe once again. behind it, cold air coming in so we've got showers asd well. we've seen a few centimetres of snow on northern hills, courtesy of this weather front, evern with snow on lower levels as it clears and these showers behind progressively turning to sleet and snow, possibly even at lower levels with heavier showers and these are the towns and city temperatures so out in the countryside, out on the roads and the pavements, temperatures at freezing the risk of it being treacherously icy. so it does what is says.

that cold weather front brings in colder air behind it, with significant snow across parts of europe. for ourselves, a bitter north—westerly wind. so those areas exposed to the wind seeing a lot of showers through the day ahead. possibly snow through the central lowlands through the morning rush, across the antrim hills, so affecting some of the highly populated parts of northern ireland as well with that wintriness, and progressively moving into north—western parts of england and wales. at the same time, we're still clearing our weather front and turning it to snow quite readily, not too far away so there is potential for wet snow as it clears awat from east anglia and the south—east hence the ice risk being widespread. the showers through the day progress further east turning to snow. some hail, some thunder, gusty winds near them as we've seen on the weather front and with only 3—6 degrees temperature—wise, therefore the potential is there for snow to lower levels across the midlands in the afternoon and those winds will make it feel even more bitter than it has recently so through the evening, there's a potential this evening that we could see a few centimetres of snow, even at lower levels across the south—east and east anglia before the showers

he's a little through the night and a widespread frost will follow, even colder through the coming night, —10 potentially across the snowfields of scotla nd but that does promise that wednesday should be drier, fewer showers, lighter winds, perhaps still that wintry shower risk for the east and south—east and later in the day, it clouds over in the west but it's still bitterly cold despite lighter winds and despite the sunshine. is there anything milder on the horizon? well, possibly on friday temporarily, but the cold air is never too far away. as ever, you can get all the warning information from our website. this is newsday on the bbc. i'm rico hizon in singapore. the headlines: a new warning about the global economy. could slowing growth in china squeeze the outlook for the whole world? the risks remain. it will depend a lot on what happens with the trade talks. theresa may outlines her plan b for brexit, but critics say it doesn't go far enough. i'm babita sharma in london.

also in the programme: the diplomatic stand—off between china and canada. dozens of former diplomats call on xi jinping to release two canadian citizens. and we'll bring you the story of how peppa pig inspired chinese twins to request a visit to see queen elizabeth.