5801
« on: September 19, 2014, 1925 UTC »
This is going to take awhile, but here goes; A majority of people on the Zanzibar Islands don't consider themselves to be Tanzanians. It's an autonomous and rather ancient polity. Arabs, Indonesians, Indians, Persians, Chinese, Romans, and Greeks all came there to trade well before the birth of Christ.
The East African coast from the southern border of what is now Mozambique to Somalia was known as "The Land of The Zanj" which basically meant "The Land of The Blacks" from antiquity. Zanj, of course, is root word for Zanzibar. The Chinese Admiral, Zheng He, made a visit there in the early part of the 15th century with his great treasure fleet.
It was the capital of Oman for about a century, until the British were asked to step in to settle an Omani dynastic squabble there in the mid-1800's. The resulting solution was the creation of the Sultanate of Zanzibar, which lasted as a British Protectorate until the 1970's, when it merged with Tanganyika to form Tanzania.
After the merger, there was a brutal war of conquest by the Tanganyikan's on the islands that made up the former Sultanate of Zanzibar, killing and expelling much of the Indian and Arab population who had been there for centuries. It was settled by making the islands of the old Zanzibar Sultanate an autonomous region. However, there are still a lot of hard feelings in Zanzibar towards the mainland government.
To make a long story short, many Zanzibaris loathe to refer to themselves as "Tanzanians", due to recent history. I suspect that's why they leave off "Tanzania" in their broadcast id's.
Show Posts