Tanzania

A union of a mainland and an island, and the one African state that tried to build socialism from the village up. Tanganyika was German East Africa until 1919, where the Maji Maji rebellion of 1905 to 1907 was suppressed with a famine policy that killed perhaps a quarter of a million people, then a British mandate. Zanzibar was an Omani sultanate that had been the centre of the East African slave and clove trade, ruled by an Arab minority over an African majority. Tanganyika became independent in 1961 under Julius Nyerere, Zanzibar's revolution overthrew the sultan in January 1964, and the two united that April. Nyerere's Arusha Declaration of 1967 set out ujamaa, an African socialism based on communal villages, and the villagisation programme that followed moved millions of people, often by force, and did not raise output. It did produce near-universal primary schooling and a national language, Swahili, that gave the country an unusual freedom from ethnic politics among more than a hundred groups. Nyerere stepped down voluntarily in 1985. Tanzanian troops removed Idi Amin. Kilimanjaro and the Serengeti are here. Dodoma is the official capital and Dar es Salaam the largest city. The country has about sixty-seven million people and over a hundred and twenty ethnic groups. Swahili is the national language and English is used in higher courts and universities. Kilimanjaro is the highest point in Africa. Olduvai Gorge and Laetoli hold some of the oldest hominin remains and footprints known. Zanzibar keeps its own president and legislature.

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